February 9 1999 OPINION
James Heartfield
'Flirtation is often a component part of teaching methods - it's certainly one way to capture the attention of bored students'
THERE is no pleasure so great, according to Confucius, as watching a man fall off a roof. Schadenfreude is as natural a human emotion as love. So one can forgive the teaching unions their moment of pleasure at the discomfiture of Chris Woodhead. The Chief Inspector of Schools' comments, which appeared to condone sex between teachers and pupils, and the revelation that he enjoyed a relationship with a former pupil, have led to calls for his resignation. Teachers' unions feel that their members have been unfairly victimised for falling standards by Mr Woodhead. Now their persecutor is getting his comeuppance after a Hoddlesque gaffe. You sow what you reap.
But the unions which are delighted to see Mr Woodhead slip up should realise that their members are on the same flimsy roof. And the Government is making it more dangerous still.
Allegations of sexual impropriety between teachers and pupils provoke understandable outrage. But teachers should know better than anyone that it is unwise to hurl unsubstantiated allegations of sexual abuse. Changes in public attitudes and the law have made teachers especially vulnerable to false charges of sexual misconduct.
The numbers of allegations made against teachers by pupils trebled in the three years after the Children Act came into force in 1991, although the number of staff convicted or sacked remains as low as before.
Clearly social attitudes towards child abuse have changed. In the past, child sexual abuse was so taboo that allegations were routinely disbelieved, allowing that minority of abusers a free rein. But where we used to turn a blind eye we are now in danger of wagging the witchfinders' finger. Today it is impossible to discount allegations of abuse made against teachers. According to some child welfare professionals, it is wrong to assume that children can lie. One wonders how they explain Just William.
As anyone who has children, or works with them, knows, children do tell lies, often, and sometimes they tell serious lies. Thanks to Esther Rantzen and others, children are also very aware of the neurotic charge which allegations of sexual abuse provoke. These issues are discussed in their hearing in the media, home and school. Pupils may not be au fait with every detail of the 1989 Children Act, any more than the unemployed were intimate with the details of Peter Lilley's legislative programme, but in both cases they "know their rights". The word went around the playground in no time that teachers were no longer allowed to lay hands on their pupils. We should not be surprised that children know the force of an allegation of inappropriate sexual behaviour, even if they are only dimly aware of its full ramifications. Nor should we be surprised that pupils deploy this weapon against teachers.
The central provision of the Children Act is that the interests of the child should be paramount. This may be an admirable sentiment. But elevated to a legal principle, it is a disaster. It leads to the conclusion that all rights and protections previously afforded adults are trumped by the interests of the child. In practice it leads to an assumption that the accused is guilty until proven otherwise.
With the new changes in the law of consent teachers will be opened up to yet more allegations of misconduct. Under the new law, sexual relations between teachers and pupils aged between 16 and 18 are criminal. Such relations were always a breach of school discipline and a sacking offence. But the intervention of the law only increases the distrust between staff and pupils.
Both the Children Act and the new law on consent represent the clumsy intrusion of law into relations that were once subject to self- regulation. Trying to impose the strict framework of legal rights and duties on to teachers and pupils fails to take account of the rich complexity of school life. The truth is that flirtation is often a component part of teaching methods - though no longer one that is tolerated, as many older teachers are finding. This kind of banter on the part of teachers is not ordinarily evidence of attraction, let alone intent. It is just a way of catching the attention of another bored classroom.
With the new law of consent in place, alongside the Children Act, the courts are encouraging pupils to take flirtation for abuse. By raising the stakes about relations between teachers and pupils, the law breaks down the trust that previously existed, and substitutes a presumption that teachers are potential sexual predators. The outcome of the new law on consent might be to eroticise student-teacher relations, not protect school pupils.
-- Jim heartfield