Big Brother Britain: 2,000 Children in Scotland Reported for ‘Hate Crimes’
The children were reported to their local education authorities for ‘hate speech crimes’ including homophobia, racism and ‘sectarian bigotry’.
The number comes on top of the nearly 30,000 children in England and Wales accused of similar ‘crimes’ in just one year.
The majority of the alleged offenders were primary school children, and some were even toddlers at nursery.The figures reveal that a total of 1,913 incidents of ‘discriminatory or prejudicial behaviour’ were reported in Scottish nursery, primary and secondary schools in the three-year period.
The vast majority were for racism, and 1,150 involved children at primary school. Out of the 539 incidents logged in Glasgow, almost two-thirds were in primaries, while nine involved toddlers at nursery schools.
The 1,913 total is likely to be even higher, as five councils either refused to respond to the request for information or did not do so in the six weeks they are legally allowed to take.
In nearly all the instances reported, the ‘offending’ child's parent, parents or legal guardians were informed, while in others, pupils were suspended or excluded. In a handful of cases, the police were called in.
A Scottish Government spokeswoman said the Equality Act 2010 places a duty on local authorities to actively deal with inequality.
In England, following the introduction of the Race Relations Act 2000, schools were placed under a duty to report all ‘racist’ incidents to their local authority.
Racist incident forms were created that required teachers to name the alleged perpetrator and victim and spell out what they did and how they were punished. Schools can keep these details on file.
In Scotland, it is left up to individual councils to decide what to so, but the Scottish Government ‘encourages’ councils to record the information.
Many authorities, including the biggest, Glasgow City Council, record only allegations of racist abuse. Others ask schools for reports on racist as well as sectarian and homophobic confrontations. One council, North Lanarkshire, does not record the data.
In January 2011, an FOI request for England and Wales showed that teachers and nursery school staff had reported an incredible 29,659 ‘hate crimes’ by children in 2008/09. They included pupils using phrases such as ‘white trash’ and ‘gaylord’.
One of the ‘crimes’ involved a five-year-old girl who was told off and had her parents contacted when she refused to let a black girl join in a game.
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Also see this item
from an independent Blog http://townofshame.com/archives/1182
