Teachers need the power to keep order

Shadow Schools Minister Nick Gibb has added to warnings about the Government's plans to give teenagers a direct right of appeal against exclusion.

"This Labour Government has weakened teachers’ powers to keep order in the classroom", he said.

"Nothing undermines the authority of a headteacher more than an appeals panel returning an excluded pupil back to the same school – even in cases where knives have been involved".

Gibb pledged to give head teachers more freedom to discipline violent and disruptive pupils, and to "make sure teachers have the powers they need to nip problems with behaviour in the bud before they spiral out of control."