Teacher sacked after whistleblowing on colleague who used sexualised language about young pupils

Martin Shipton

A supply teacher who reported a colleague for making sexualised comments about under-age boys herself got sacked after they had an altercation on the Eisteddfod Maes.

Alys Bryant, who is bringing an unfair dismissal claim against the New Directions teaching agency, got to know the unqualified teacher when they worked in the same school.

Neither the unqualified teacher – who is referred to as Teacher A – nor the school can be named as a result of a court order.

‘Attention seeking’

In a written statement provided to the Employment Tribunal in Cardiff, Ms Bryant said: “My initial feeling towards Teacher A was that I did not like them. Teacher A was very attention-seeking, loud and liked to hold court in the staffroom. In the end, though, I got talking to Teacher A and thought they were quite entertaining.

“Teacher A told me they had been dismissed from a previous school they worked at because boys at the school had reported them for inappropriate sexually charged behaviour. The way in which Teacher A relayed the story to me left me feeling that they had been the victim of horrible slurs.I thought the boys that reported Teacher A were troublemakers and I recall feeling upset and angry that the school had believed the troublemakers.”

‘Weird’

Later, however, Ms Bryant grew concerned at Teacher A’s behaviour. In late Autumn 2022 he had rung her on the internal school phone to say – in a voice she said sounded like he was excited or aroused – “I have a class full of testosterone here. Ms Bryant said in her statement: “I remember thinking the comment by Teacher A was weird and it made me uncomfortable.” She had also disapproved of the fact that he was recording children in the Sports Hall when Wales played Iran in the football World Cup, despite having been repeatedly not to do so.

Ms Bryant stated: “The worst comments were when Teacher A told me about two different boys’ penises, which made it absolutely clear that Teacher A had been looking. One boy was described as having a “banana in his trousers”. Teacher A said the boy was probably asking to go to the loo so that he could have a ‘wank’. In the same conversation he moved onto another boy’s penis where he referred to the boy as being ‘blessed by god’ as he could see the outline of a large penis in the boy’s tight jogging bottoms.”

‘Alarm bells’

Ms Bryant added: “The above comments were made around the beginning of December 2022 and it was at this stage that alarm bells started to ring and I realised this was serious. I remember thinking: ‘Oh my gosh, those poor boys at the previous school. They were telling the truth.’

After a period of doubt about whether she would be believed, she sent an anonymous letter to the Senior Leadership Team in which she outlined her concerns about Teacher A.

She stated: “Around a week after I sent the letter, I bumped into Teacher A in the staffroom. I tried to say ‘hi’ but Teacher A just looked away from me and made it clear they were ignoring me. I thought at this point it must be because my complaint had been received and Teacher A had been informed of it. My fears were confirmed when Teacher A did several other unpleasant things that were aimed at me such as leaving a ‘Poison Pen’ Wikipedia page on their computer screen so that I could see it.”

Subsequently, when Ms Bryant became concerned at the possibility that Teacher A could be left alone with a boy in the detention room, she told the child safeguarding officer at the school.

The headteacher told her that they hadn’t taken action on the basis of the anonymous letter because of the possibility that it was malicious. But now she had identified herself, and was a reliable source, they would follow it up.

Safeguarding officer

Ms Bryant stated: “I wasn’t told that Teacher A had been dismissed from the school, but I found out soon enough that this was the case. A few hours after I met with the head and the safeguarding officer, Teacher A burst into the PE classroom where I was, crimson with fury, and swore at me and had a prolonged rant at me. I was alone in the classroom and Teacher A called me a ‘fucking bitch’ and said, ‘what the fuck did I ever do to you?’ I really thought Teacher A was going to come up to me and hit me, so uncontrollable was their rage.”

The incident at the National Eisteddfod happened in Ynysangharad Park, Pontypridd, where the cultural event was held in August 2024.

Ms Bryant stated: “The morning passed without incident but at around 1.30pm I was coming out of the ladies’ toilets near the lido and had just rejoined my mother when Teacher A came up behind me and said, ‘There she is the old bitch’. I was in shock and tried to say something but Teacher A overpowered me and started a tirade of abuse as they had done before at School A on the day they were removed.

“ … I wanted Teacher A to go away from me and my mother. As Teacher A continued with the abuse I tried to say: ‘you’re a paedophile’, just so that they would leave us alone, but I couldn’t get a word in edgeways, so when they turned around to march off I said again: ‘you’re a paedophile’.”

Teacher A reported the incident to the police, and subsequently she was contacted by David Lewis, the education safeguarding officer for New Directions, for whom she had worked as a languages teacher for eight and a half years with an unblemished record.

Mr Lewis told the tribunal that he had dismissed Ms Bryant because of her unprofessional conduct in calling Teacher A a paedophile at a public event. He did not consider it part of his duties to investigate the past conduct of Teacher A.

The case continues.