The teachers’ union, Gibraltar NASUWT, denies that it has politicized the debate over the report regarding a case of grooming by a teacher on a young person in 2019.

In a statement released this afternoon, the union said:

“Gibraltar NASUWT would like to clarify that it has not misled the public with yesterday’s statement. We did not wait for the Chief Secretary to respond to our correspondence because ours was a final reply to his prior unsatisfactory and disappointing correspondence indicating that he did not consider it appropriate to take action until another investigation was conducted.

“If the Government found it unfortunate that the Union exposed this matter, then it should ensure that in future, Senior Management at the DoE does not behave in the unprofessional and reckless manner it did regarding the handling of a case of grooming by a teacher on a young person in 2019. The Union will continue pointing out any shortcomings if and when they arise, and any unprofessional behaviour or gross misconduct of Senior Management, because that is our duty and it is the commitment we have given to our members. We will never apologise for doing the right thing.

“Further, the Union has not politicised the matter. It informed the Government that to its knowledge the GSD and Together Gibraltar had also received a copy of the independent report. Therefore, it stood to reason that we should lobby the only bodies who had a copy like ourselves, whilst at the same time urge the general public to call for the report to be published by the Government. In this way, everyone could reach their own conclusions about the conduct of the gatekeepers of our education system during a crisis incident relating to safeguarding. It would appear that lately the Government feels that any criticism levied at them is an attempt at politicising an issue, but we all have a responsibility to keep the discourse serious and not fall into the trap of taking opportunistic shots at each other to deflect from the real argument.

“Finally, the Union challenges the Government to substantiate what they have labelled as a shameful and unsubstantiated insinuation by the NASUWT that there is an institutionalised culture in Education and by some in senior management to not act professionally, responsibly, ethically and always in the interests of students, by making the independent report conducted by Ms Gillian Guzman QC and all its appendices public. Otherwise, this becomes a game of blame tennis which gets us nowhere positive. We do not wish to continue this unsavoury exchange of public statements and will raise all matters of interest regarding this matter in our next meeting with the Chief Minister scheduled for later this month.”