KEY POINTS:
Court of Appeal judges have backed a teenager who took the Auckland high school that expelled him to court and won.
But they disagreed with two important issues from an earlier High Court ruling on the case - a move that principals say will make it easier to deal with troublesome pupils.
The Ministry of Education altered its advice to boards of trustees after the High Court ruling last year and said yesterday that it would consider the new judgment and update guidance to schools as necessary.
The student - who cannot be legally identified and is known in court documents as "J" - was kicked out of Lynfield College last year but returned after winning a judicial review of the school's decision to expel him.
The college and principal Stephen Bovaird appealed and said at the time they had no intention of removing J again but wanted clarification after the ruling on how to apply the law.
An Appeal Court judgment given by Justice Mark O'Regan yesterday dismissed the school's appeal and awarded $3000 costs to J.
J's mother told the Herald her son, now 17 and planning to apply to university for next year, was relieved at having a final outcome for the case more than a year after it started.
"We're pleased it's over."
She said they felt compelled to go ahead because she feared no other school would want her son - who would be an expelled 16-year-old - in its ranks.
Principals said the schools had been struggling to operate under amended guidelines handed out after the original case.
But Secondary Principals Association president Peter Gall said the Appeal Court judges' remarks clarified schools' responsibilities in the preliminary stages of investigating allegations of students playing up.
The comments related to the extent of natural justice requirements and whether a principal had to consult a student's parents before making a decision to suspend.
Mr Gall said the earlier High Court ruling caused problems for schools trying to contact parents at the very early stages of an investigation. He said it was no surprise the Appeal Court did not overturn the individual decision on J, but there was widespread relief it removed implications that were "clearly impracticable".
"Those two parts of the decision are really returning to the status quo that existed before the judgment," said Mr Gall. "It doesn't mean to say parents are not going to be informed about all those sorts of things - of course they are."
ORDER OF EVENTS
* J was suspended in March last year after he was caught wagging with a cannabis pipe in his bag.
* He returned to Lynfield College on strict conditions - including random drug testing - but was one of five students who misbehaved the next week at camp at Mt Tongariro, and J was later again suspended and then expelled.
* He was allowed back to school after winning a judicial review in the High Court.
* The Court of Appeal has ruled process was not correctly followed for the second suspension and expulsion. It said the principal should have referred J back to the board for it to consider its earlier decision to reinstate the student rather than suspending J.
