Monday 4 December 2000
NASUWT CLAIMS RECORD STRESS COMPENSATION FOR TEACHER
The NASUWT has today (4 December 2000) announced a record payment of £254,362 secured for a woman teacher in compensation for the stress which led directly to her enforced early ill-health retirement.
Speaking at a press conference to announce the award, Nigel de Gruchy, General Secretary of NASUWT (the teachers’ union with 180,217 in-service members) said:
"Government and employers had better wake up quickly to the soaring costs of work-related stress.
"The case of our member, Mrs Janice Howell and the Newport County Borough Council (formerly Gwent C.C.), contains all the classic causes of stress against which the NASUWT has been warning. These include:
1.intense pressure from successive Governments for schools to retain disruptive and violent youngsters as well as coping with other special needs pupils in mainstream schools;
2.lack of suitable alternative educational provision for emotionally disturbed youngsters;
3.totally inadequate resources;
4.incompetent and uncaring management.
"If work-related stress is not taken more seriously by Government and employers it could become the cancer and chief killer of the 21st Century.
"The case illustrates how intolerable it was to expect Jan Howell to cope with 11 special needs pupils in her mainstream school class with next to no support, having to deal with a seriously disturbed youngster who had previously been expelled from two other schools, with no cover provided for staff off sick and with her persistent calls for help ignored.
"I want to pay tribute to the great personal courage being shown by Jan Howell in facing the world publicly today to highlight the problem and hopefully play a part in preventing other teachers from suffering a similar fate.
"Whilst a quarter of a million pounds is a considerable sum of money it is in scant compensation for the ill health and loss of career Jan Howell has unfortunately had to suffer. Hopefully the Government and employers will learn the lesson that cries for help are genuine and not just the whingeings of disgruntled teachers."