EDUCATION: Bullies should be beaten

Most adults believe school bullies should suffer corporal punishment, according to a survey of school safety.

More than half the adults questioned (55 per cent) said they thought corporal punishment should be brought back for children who preyed on others - while 74 per cent said bullies should be expelled; 53 per cent believed the police should be called in to deal with cases of bullying.

The findings of the poll, in which NOP interviewed 1,000 adults for She magazine, come just over a year after the Dunblane massacre, and after it emerged that the schoolgirl killer Sharon Carr had also knifed a 13- year-old in her school toilets. In the wake of this, the poll found almost half wanted closed-circuit television to be installed in schools.

Some eight out of 10 felt schools were less safe than they used to be, with a similar number believing police should regularly advise on security. Almost 90 per cent felt teachers were inadequately prepared to cope with any threats.