Children `put at risk by parasite teacher agencies'

Fran Abrams reports from the Glasgow conference of the National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers

Private teacher agencies were condemned as "parasites" by a union yesterday amid accusations that some were failing to check whether their recruits were convicted child abusers.

In one case, a man whose name was on a Government list of people considered unfit to teach was recruited by an agency to work in a primary school.

The National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers conference in Glasgow heard that pupils were at risk through increasing levels of casual labour.

Up to 40 agencies have been set up in the past few years, many of them operating in London and other large cities. While some check applicants' names against the Government's "List 99" of about 3,000 banned teachers and against police records, others do not, according to the union.

Martin Johnson, a secondary school teacher from Lewisham, London, said that while schools paid pounds 130 for a local authority supply teacher they often paid as little as pounds 100 for an agency teacher, with the recruit receiving only pounds 75 of that sum.

He said a union colleague had been shocked to see a teacher at a south London primary school who had left the profession because of serious allegations against him. The man was on "List 99", but had re-entered the classroom by signing on with an agency.

A survey showed that a quarter of head teachers were not sure whether checks had been made on their agency staff, Mr Johnson said. "Some of the agencies are trying to give services and they are trying to give quality. Others are cowboys."

Mr Johnson said there were between 700 and 1,000 agency teachers in London alone, many of them from Australia and New Zealand. Employers were required to make checks on staff, but some agencies said their recruits were self-employed.

Agencies were being used to fill long-term posts in order to save money, and pupils at one school had 13 different science teachers in one year, Mr Johnson claimed.

His motion to the conference condemned the agencies as "parasites upon the education service, undermining salary levels and conditions of service and putting pupils at risk", and called for all agency teachers to be subject to checks and receive the same pay and pension benefits as other staff.

Nigel de Gruchy, general secretary of the union said: "People get round `List 99' by going to agencies and it is a defect in the system which needs to be put right. Our chief concern is the casualisation of the profession and the way agencies offer lower salaries."

nNational action could be taken over government plans to name incompetent teachers, the union warned last night. Delegates described the new grading system as "facile and iniquitous".

Inspectors could face formal hearings and legal action may be taken on behalf of teachers who have been failed. From this term, lessons will be marked from one to seven and inspectors will report staff who achieve only grade one or two.