Shields Weekly News, South Shields, Co. Durham, 28 July 1983

Councillor denies Wackford Squeers image

Schools high in beating league

Ralph Gardner High School is branded among the worst with "repeat beatings" of the same pupils the highest in the country.

The report was compiled by STOPP - the Society of Teachers Opposed to Physical Punishment.

Ralph Gardner's ratio of 23.1 beatings per 100 pupils puts it at No. 19 in the STOPP national top 20.

Eight boys were beaten five times or more, five boys four times and 11 boys three times.

Another North Tyneside school, St. Aidan's RC High School in Wallsend is in the STOPP table at No. 9 with its tally of 143 recorded beatings all on boys out of just 480 pupils, a ratio of 29.8 per cent.

This school beat six boys on at least five separate occasions each during one year.

Willington High School in Wallsend recorded at least 197 beatings of which 28 were on girls -- a ratio of 22.4 per cent and No. 20 in the STOPP top twenty.

A spokesman for North Tyneside Council said the education department had not received a copy of the STOPP report and did not wish to comment.

Coun. Alan Furness, Conservative spokesman on education, said: "I have always been in favour of figures being published but I am against schools being named.

"I feel it would have been much better if the council had come clean in the first place and released the figures itself.

"But the Wackford Squeers image which has been painted of this authority is not true. The number of pupils receiving corporal punishment has declined dramatically over the years."

In February the Education Committee recommended that corporal punishment should be abolished but this was referred back to the committee by the full council for new legal advice.

Education Committee Chairman, Coun. Stephen Byers, was not available for comment.