GIVE A SECOND CHANCE, SAYS MINISTER

Don't Expel Drug Takers, Schools Told

CHILDREN who experiment with drugs should not be expelled from school
automatically, teachers will
be told in government guidelines to be published tomorrow.

Estelle Morris, the School Standards Minister, told independent school
headmistresses yesterday that she understood parents' desire for "zero
tolerance" , but it was often better to give a second chance to lessen
the risk of children sliding into regular usage.

In a speech to the Girls' Schools Association in Glasgow, Ms Morris
said drug takers' welfare must be balanced against the need for
punishment and the protection of the wider school community. Dealers
would normally be expelled, but many head teachers would take a
different view of "someone found with cannabis in their pockets".

The remarks were condemned immediately by a head teachers' leader.
John Dunford, general secretary of the Secondary Heads Association,
said the authority of head teachers would be undermined. "Any kind of
pressure on heads in this direction is unwelcome. There is a need to
give a very strong message to children. It is difficult enough to keep
schools out of the drugs scene," he said.

David Hart, general secretary of the National Association of Head
Teachers, said the advice would receive a mixed reception in schools.

The guidelines on drug education, produced in consultation with Keith
Hellawell, the Government's "drugs czar", will aim to reduce
expulsions, which have doubled in the past five years to more than
12,000 a year in state schools. They will advocate specialist
education from the age of five and use of a wider range of punishments
for drug offences.

However, Ms Morris ruled out random testing of drugtaking pupils at
state schools as a condition of continued attendance. Many independent
schools - no figures for expulsions were available - test pupils
involved with drugs, with parents' agreement, but ministers believe
legal difficulties would prove insurmountable in the state system.

Ms Morris emphasised that schools would remain free to expel even for
possession. They will still be expected to report drug takers to
police, although most such cases now result only in a caution. She
added: "There has got to be a bottom line in drug education that
taking drugs is harmful and wrong. That has always got to be the basic
message."

Ms Morris added: "Drugs are a crime but they are also a welfare
problem." Automatic expulsion could deprive children of support they
needed to break a cycle of dependency. Once young people had been
found taking drugs, it was usually too late to "sit them down and tell
them not to do it".

The guidelines will form part of the Government's effort to reduce
exclusions by a third by 2002.

Mr Dunford said head teachers would feel trapped between parents
wanting a hard line on drugs and local authorities anxious to meet
targets.

Ms Morris, who was promoted in the summer reshuffle after serving as
deputy to Stephen Byers as School Standards Minister, was seen as one
of the unsung successes of the Government's first year. She had
increased her majority in her Birmingham Yardley constituency at the
last election. She was formerly a teacher at Sydney Stringer
Comprehensive School in Coventry, and told the headmistresses that
although she was single and not a parent, she could imagine the
anxieties felt by families over drugs.

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Checked-by: Patrick Henry