BBC claims ‘economic downturn’ will cause more attacks on teachers by pupils

On Saturday a number of national and regional media outlets reported the story of 10-year-old boy attacking two female teachers at his school ‘in Avalon Road, Orpington’. It resulted in both teachers being taken to hospital – one with a broken leg and dislocated kneecap and the other bearing facial injuries.

None of the outlets went into any more detail, not even the name of the school or its background. Instead the Autonomous Mind blog was left with an exclusive about the school, Burwood School, an establishment for boys with special educational needs that has a number of troubled and previously excluded youngsters on its small roll. No other media sought out and reported these details.

Some hours later the details carried on Autonomous Mind, including the elements of the 2011 Ofsted report cited in the blog post, were picked up by BBC London who despatched Paul Curran to the previously un-named school to deliver the details in a BBC London news report.

But being the BBC, the report just had to include a different slant that furthered a favoured and seemingly unrelated pet narrative. This saw Curran lead in to a televised quote by a teaching union official from an un-named union, who himself was also un-named, by saying:

One teaching union expects the situation to get worse because of the economic downturn.

But can you spot any mention of the economic downturn in the official’s broadcast assessment of attacks on teachers by their pupils, quoted in its entirety below?

In today’s society, where lives are difficult, stressful, often chaotic, it’s no wonder that very occasionally children go completely off the rails.

There could be any number of causes for lives being difficult, stressful or chaotic. But the BBC has decided the cause of an increase in attacks on teachers will be as a result of the economic downturn.

This isn’t factual news reporting, it is opportunist speculation mixed with personal opinion, pushed on viewers without any supporting evidence whatsoever. And it deliberately ignores the particular circumstances of the incident at Burwood School given the challenging nature of the school’s troubled pupils.

It has no place on a publicly funded service broadcaster, but it happens over and over again.

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23 Responses to BBC claims ‘economic downturn’ will cause more attacks on teachers by pupils

  1. Big Harry says:

    The sooner BBC television centre and its other left wing clubhouses are burned down and the earth salted the better.

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  2. ian says:

    New impartial evidence from a left-wing think tank shows that global warming is getting worse thanks to the Conservative-inspired economic downturn. If Labour was in control Bangladesh would not be on the point of sinking. Instead it would be as high as Mount Everest, because Milliband would increase public sector pay by borrowing from China, and the interest would pay for a lift. But to counter accusations of bias, we now show a Tory being beaten up by UAF interviewers.

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    • grangebank says:

      Here we go . Take one event , then take another event , and say one caused the other because they happen near enough the same time . Even if the times overlap or one event is long term and the other short .

      Immigration is up , and crime is up .

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  3. john says:

    Effectively Curran is suggesting that there wouldn’t be any broken legs or bruised faces had Labour remained in Government.
    So this is the price all Teachers will have to pay for a witless electorate deciding on a Coalition.
    And to think that this behaviour never occurred at SEN School’s prior to Cameron.
    Way to go Curran !!

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  4. Jeff Waters says:

    My housemate Ian was a teacher until recently.  He quit following an incident with a 16 year old pupil, where the pupil threw a chair at Ian’s head, and Ian responded by pinning the pupil to the wall by the neck (in self-defence).

    Thirty years ago, the kid would have been expelled and possibly locked up, and that would have been the end of the matter.  But instead, Ian was treated like a criminal by the woolly liberals who were in charge of education in his school, and it left such a bad taste in his mouth that he resigned in disgust.  That’s a shame – Ian has left a job he enjoyed, and I get the impression that he’s a caring bloke who was passionate about teaching, so the education system has probably lost a bloody good teacher.

    That there are so many unruly and violent pupils is largely because teachers and parents aren’t allowed to administer proper discipline, including corporal punishment.  Liberalism has undermined discipline in the classroom, not austerity measures…

    Jeff

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    • matthew rowe says:

      Sad to hear but as we know it is impossible to sack a useless teacher so they think it’s  much better to let the goods one resign!!

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      • ian says:

        It’s the same with Church of England bishops – hence Michael Nazir-Ali’s departure to fight anti-Christian persecution in the middle and far east.

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  5. Span Ows says:

    Well done AM. 

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  6. Paul Weston says:

    Unfortunately for us, the BBC/leftist style of propaganda works. Little lies as la Richard Black, repeated every day for years and decades result in The Big Lie eventually being accepted as the truth. Never forget that the Socialist States of the last decade were fully aware they were living a lie and therefore needed to practice continual propaganda. The left are experts at it. No lie too tall, no child too small – as Lenin might have said.

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  7. Asuka Langley Soryu says:

    Billy Bragg is involved in this somehow, I just know it. Why, I can practically see his wretched face when I read the article.

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  8. As I See It says:

    It comes as no surprise to me that in their coverage of this story BBC London should default to one of their prejudices.

    The BBC London outfit produce news that is noticably leftist in tone and they follow very closely current Labour Party and Trades Union talking points.

    Watch their news bulletins and again and again you will hear the tell tale phrases : ‘NHS cuts’ and ‘too deep, too fast’.

    Of course BBC London are now gearing up to full blown re-elect Ken mode.

    When Ken Livingston was Mayor BBC London were more than happy to nightly read out his press releases and to provide puff for his campaigns.

    And on the subject of education– I read this week that 50% of Labour Party members are teachers. Not Labour voters, actual paid-up members.

    I can only speculate on the cause and effect there – I don’t believe it is a diliberate infiltration – perhaps it’s something to do with having spare time for party work, ward meetings etc?

    Explains a lot about our schools, though.

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  9. My Site (click to edit) says:

    The importance of cultural diversity in the school place.

       0 likes

    • marc fanton says:

      That is so funny i thought for minute he was a lefty nutcase then it dawned on me ,very clever.

         0 likes

      • My Site (click to edit) says:

        He’s great. I’d highly recommend subscribing to his Youtube channel.

           0 likes

    • Beness says:

      Superb clip. An obvious spoof but tells it like it is and there really are “progressives” out there like him. Unfortunately for us the have power.

         0 likes

  10. RGH says:

    This has nothing, absolutely nothing to do with ‘downturns’. Having taught in third world conditions as a young teacher let me assure you that poverty, absolute material poverty does not produce violence in schools.

    Special needs units are the ‘in extremis’ in our system. A place where pupil teacher ratios and expenditure per capita is much higher than for the vast majority of reasonably socialised children.

    Highly disturbed children…often a threat to themselves as well ad to other children are placed in these units after exhaustive discussions to and fro.

    The dominant ethos is inclusion.

    That violence and anti-social behaviour is concentrated in these places is inevitable.

    I repeat. To attribute this shocking incident to ‘austerity’ or what you will ,is specious politicking. Instrumentalisation of the worst kind.

    It is shameful.

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  11. Jeremy Clarke says:

    ‘A BBC journalist has been criticised for filing a speculative, intellectually incoherent report which blames the economic downturn for an attack by a 10-year-old special needs pupil on two teachers.

    ‘The report, which aired on BBC News last night, was widely derided, with critics accusing the reporter of filling dead air by spouting random bollocks.

    ‘But, analysts claim, such terrible reporting is likely to get worse because of the Coalition’s spending cuts and climate change.

    ‘In a statement, BBC News’s Deputy Vice-Head of Scaremongering and Idle Speculation defended his reporter, claiming that BBC News annoys everyone equally so they must be “getting it about right”.’

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  12. cjhartnett says:

    Now the BBC have moved to Salford, I do hope that the troubled and vulnerable young people of Salford take note.
    The average teacher will get about £30,000 pa, whereas the average Beeb executive there will get as much as £150,00 perhaps.
    The Beeb executives also will have nicer cars and will be running regularly towards canalside apartments(A56) or heading out towards Wilmslow etc(A556)…and they`d not like to make a fuss if you clean them out, because that would mean that all their programmes and liberal sentiments have been wrong.
    The BBC never apologise-except for we white trashy racist types. so if I were an Ordsall Oik…I could bring in my own Tubby Tax and redistribute a bit of public sector “investment” on behalf of the BBC-that really has more money than sense and could do with a little being knocked into it(in a loving, caring and non-judgemental way of course!)

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  13. cjhartnett says:

    Avalon Road eh?…on the Aquarius Estate no doubt!
    The New Age colonisation has had its desired effect then…love,peace and fairies all round!

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  14. DJ says:

    In so far as the BBC seems to be suggesting that 10 year olds are driven to violence by cut backs in public sector pensions, I’d say they’ve tipped over from mere bias to actual psychosis.

    Meanwhile, in the real world, some of us are wondering if there’s a connection between increasing instances of dysfunctional insanity in the real world and a national broadcaster which keeps presenting dysfunctional insanity as normal, or even glamorous.

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  15. Barry says:

    “Special needs” = normally a euphemism for a nasty, spiteful, uncontrollable little bastard.

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