The High Court has rejected a primary school principal's attempt to overturn a Teaching Council finding of poor professional performance arising from a 19-week delay in informing parents of an allegation concerning their nine-year-old, pre-verbal child with autism.
An SNA alleged in February 2019 that the child's teacher had removed his ear defenders without warning and shouted at him while instructing him to finish a jigsaw. The allegation was passed to the principal, identified in the judgment only as L, who conducted an internal investigation and ultimately found it unproven.
The child's parents were not formally informed by the principal until June 26, 2019. They later complained about that delay.
Following a Teaching Council inquiry, a disciplinary panel found in March 2024 that the 19-week omission amounted to poor professional performance. It concluded that a competent principal should have recognised the importance of promptly telling the parents about a serious allegation involving a particularly vulnerable child. The panel later imposed an admonishment, described as the second-lowest available sanction.
L challenged those decisions on numerous grounds. He argued, among other things, that the panel lacked a serving primary school principal, should have heard expert evidence, failed to give adequate reasons, wrongly rejected his reliance on confidentiality requirements, was objectively biased, reversed the burden of proof and acted inconsistently by imposing a relatively low sanction after describing the conduct as serious.
Mr Justice Barr rejected each challenge. He held that the panel's members had sufficient education and teaching experience and that expert evidence was unnecessary for the relatively straightforward issues involved.
The court also held that the panel had given clear reasons and was entitled to reject L's argument that a Department circular prevented him from informing the parents while the disciplinary process concerning the teacher was continuing.
The judge stressed that judicial review concerns legality rather than whether the High Court would have reached the same decision. He found the panel was entitled to regard the delay as a serious falling below professional standards, even though it was a once-off incident.
All reliefs were refused. Final orders and costs were left for later determination.