03/08/11
Wales seeks to plug regulatory gap left by GTCE demise
The General Teaching Council for Wales (GTCW) has approved measures to reduce the risk that ‘unsuitable’ teachers might be able to slip undetected into jobs in Wales following GTCE abolition.
In future, teachers from outside Wales seeking registration in Wales will be required to make a written declaration as to whether or not they have ever been subject to a bar or partial bar from teaching by the Secretary of State for Education or the Independent Safeguarding Authority for misconduct, or whether they have ever been subject to disciplinary action by a professional or regulatory body.
They will also be required to declare whether or not they are currently, or have ever been, subject to disciplinary action by an employer or supply teaching agency.
Making a deliberate false declaration will in itself be regarded as serious professional misconduct and would make the teacher concerned subject to action by the Council.
GTCW Deputy Chief Executive, Hayden Llewellyn said: “Once GTCE has gone, head teachers in England who sack members of their teaching staff for misconduct will no longer be obliged to refer the matter to a professional body. Even if they choose to refer cases to the new Teaching Agency, it only has power to impose prohibition orders, so many cases are likely to go unrecorded because they are not considered serious enough to fall into that category.
“This suggests that the Government in London thinks parents do not care about professional misconduct or criminal offences which are short of the most serious cases. Serious professional incompetence will not even be referred or considered by the UK Secretary of State. We in Wales take a different view.
“England has effectively rolled the clock back to the days when effective regulation depended on the goodwill and cooperation of the employers. By abolishing the professional body in England and removing the head teacher’s obligation to report dismissals, the Government in Westminster has created a risk that applies right across the UK.
“GTCW is the first body to take steps to manage that risk in its area of jurisdiction by introducing a declaration for incoming teachers seeking to join our register,” he added.
He said the need to take action in Wales had become more urgent because GTCE has begun running down its disciplinary workload in preparation for abolition by no longer taking on any new misconduct cases it feels are unlikely to lead to a prohibition order.
In addition to prohibition orders, Professional Conduct Panels in Wales also have power to issue reprimands, suspensions or conditional registration orders to teachers. This will no longer apply in England after March 2012, when prohibition will become the only available sanction.
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