Editorial: Teachers' Council faces test

Opinion

The disclosure by the Herald on Sunday that school teachers with various criminal convictions have been allowed to remain in the classroom puts severe strain on public confidence in the profession's self-government. Its disciplinary body, the Teachers' Council, has found reason to maintain the registration of at least 13 teachers with convictions for assault, theft, drug supplying or sex offences.

It is not known who they are or which schools have engaged them. In most cases their fellow teachers, let alone parents of children in their charge, will have no idea; there would be no point in allowing such people to continue their career if their record could follow them. The teaching profession has to trust the judgment of its registration council in each case and it asks the public to trust that body too. It asks a great deal.

One of the cases concerned a teacher who had sexually abused a 15-year-old niece over two years. Another had battered an 11-year-old; another played strip poker with female students at a school camp; another had sex with a student; others were convicted for importing the drug ecstasy and supplying cannabis.

If there were redeeming considerations in each case, the file notes are not convincing. In some cases the teachers seem to be allowed to continue purely on a promise to take counselling and give employers a copy of the council's decision. Presented with the list, Education Minister Steve Maharey was sufficiently concerned to ask for a report by Tuesday and indicate he would probably seek an independent review of the decisions on Wednesday.

But at his meeting with the council on Tuesday it was agreed the decisions would not be reviewed and the council would make its own review of its procedures to see whether they might be improved. Its chairwoman, Joanna Beresford, said criticism of its decisions was "ill-informed", but she would not add to the bare facts available.

The council's priority, she said, was a safe environment for pupils. We hope so; we hope the collegiality of the profession is not giving precedence, possibly unwitting, to job security and dedicated careers. Ms Beresford asks us to take her word that pupils' safety is the first consideration.

Many would say it should be the only consideration. If that were so, no risk would be taken whatsoever; teachers who transgressed even once would be out of the job. Plainly that is not the case. The council takes it upon itself to weigh the risk to pupils against the teacher's wish for a second chance. It must be a difficult decision in some cases, relying on fine, face-to-face assessments of character that perhaps cannot be confidently stated in case reports. But some sort of check would be valuable for public reassurance.

The council has agreed with the minister to run a check on whether the teachers in those cases that have come to light have met the requirements placed on them for supervision or disclosure to employers. That is the least that should be done and it is a little disturbing that it needs to be done. Having allowed these people to stay in the profession we would have thought the Teachers' Council would have checked on their rehabilitation as a matter of course.

The public interest in this issue is not cut and dried. Good teachers are in short supply. It is possible that the public interest is best served by giving a second chance to a keen and highly skilled young teacher who regrets a foolish criminal act. But there will be no second chance for the council. If those it has trusted ever re-offend, a more rigorous system of certification will be demanded. The council would be wise now to ensure its lenience never lets us down.