FOR some teachers in Scotland, especially those who had previously been shielding, each new day in December working in a school must have felt like another whirr of the revolver’s chamber in a sick game of Russian roulette, with their own Government loading the gun and placing it in their hands.
The announcement on Saturday that, despite a new aggressive strain of Covid-19 now seeding in Scotland, schools will be fully open this week and again from January will have widened that perception to the rest of their colleagues. But the truth is that the evidence of a disturbing lack of soundness to the Scottish Government’s decisions on safety in schools had become increasingly clear even before Saturday.
On December 3, an advisory note on school holidays over the festive season was published by the Government’s Covid-19 advisory sub-group on education and children’s issues. It is worth looking at its paragraph seven in full: “There were concerns about the message [which would be sent if schools were to move to remote learning in late December and early January], which would be inconsistent with Scottish Government’s emphasis on school safety and on keeping schools open.
“Clarity and consistency of message were seen to be important factors. Closing schools for a three-week period to reduce transmission would undermine the consistent message that schools are safe and would serve to amplify the concerns that had already been expressed by teachers about the safety of working in schools.”
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This is an astonishing statement for a group of advisers to make. The message is very clear: we must not say or do anything which could give any credence whatsoever to opposing perspectives, especially those expressed by frontline staff. A group which is supposed to offer impartial advice to Government seemed to compromise itself by promulgating a politically biased position which sought to marginalise and downplay teachers’ concerns.
What kind of pressure had been placed on them by ministers to make them believe this was acceptable?
With advice like this, it was never in doubt how the Government would respond, but following John Swinney’s announcement that there would be no national move to remote learning either side of Christmas, strong-arm tactics were used to ensure that local decision-makers would not break ranks.
According to the EIS, councils were “unduly influenced by a communication from a senior civil servant”, which stated that “we expect schools to remain open”. Teachers are good at spotting bullying and this kind of behaviour, which sought to quash any potential alternative courses of action, was exactly that.
The machinations seemed to take a new twist when another report, Surveillance of Covid-19 in Education, was published by Public Health Scotland on December 16.
Public Health Scotland is, according to its mission statement, “the national agency for improving and protecting the health and wellbeing of the people of Scotland”. It is jointly sponsored by Cosla and the Scottish Government and declares: “We provide advice and support to local government and authorities in a professionally independent manner. Our values of respect, collaboration, innovation, excellence and integrity will be at the heart of our work.”
Teachers could not detect much professional independence and respect in the way this report was spun by the agency and then used by the First Minister. Its focus was entirely on some findings which indicated “that education staff and pupils have not been at an increased risk of severe coronavirus infection by being in school.”
(The italics are mine).
We soon discovered the really important finding, without the weasel words, buried on page 16 of the final chapter of the report: “The results for the whole period show that the risk of becoming a Covid-19 case was higher among teachers than the general population.”
IN other words, there was evidence in the report which supported everything teachers across the country had been saying for weeks. They are more at risk of getting Covid-19 and therefore more at risk of infecting others in the wider community including their own families. In other words, a school environment was a driver of infection even with the “old” strain of the virus.
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When she delivered her briefing on the report, the First Minister highlighted only the findings about severe infections and sought to reassure staff with her stubborn narrative that schools are safe. When it became clear she had remained silent on the evidence which contradicted that narrative, she lost all credibility. But she made things even worse with her announcement on Saturday that remote learning would begin only in January and last only a few days. Given everything that the First Minister said about the dangers of the new variant of the virus, why on Earth was the remote contingency not introduced immediately from this Monday? Where is the scientific evidence that it will be safe for staff and pupils to attend this week? The decision to stay fully open is a dangerous absurdity.
Meanwhile, after the holiday, the Government’s view is that, on Friday, January 15, the new strain will be so dangerous that schools will need to be in full remote mode, but suddenly the following Monday it will be so harmless as to allow a wholesale return with no two-metre distancing between pupils. School staff will await the scientific basis for that weekend’s transformation of fortunes with keen interest.
With so much uncertainty about the new strain, the only ethical way for ministers to progress is to apply the precautionary principle. A period of fully remote learning until the science on the new variant is unequivocal that two-metre distancing is safe, and then a period of blended learning until the science shows that distancing can be abandoned again, are the only solutions in which school staff can have complete confidence.
Anything else is just another random gamble with lives. And the government needs to take heed of recent declarations of disputes – teachers and their colleagues are not going to play any more.
Allan Crosbie is a teacher in Scotland and writes here in a personal capacity
https://publichealthscotland.scot/media/2927/report-of-record-linkage-english-december2020.pdf
https://www.tes.com/news/coronavirus-Christmas-close-schools-earlier-or-breach-teachers-rights
The list of members on the sub-group can be found here - https://www.gov.scot/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-advisory-sub-group-on-education-and-childrens-issues/
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