The Government has issued a reply to Gibraltar NASUWT’s most recent statement.

A statement from the Government follows below:

The Government of Gibraltar considers that it is self-evident that the individuals at  NASUWT who are running this campaign against senior officials in the Department of Education  are doing so in their own, narrow and vindictive interest. 

There is no other reasonable explanation for the vituperative way in which the teachers’ union is  running this attempted public vilification of some officers, with scant if no regard for the wellbeing  of the pupil in question, who is now an adult, her family and the senior officials involved, who, until  recently, were themselves members of that union. 

The NASUWT continues to ignore that the Royal Gibraltar Police, having all facts at their disposal,  have not ‘acted decisively’ in bringing a prosecution, which, the Government once again reminds  the teachers’ union, is a hugely important factor which should give any reasonable representative  organisation pause for thought. 

Instead, the reaction of the NASUWT has once again been to fail to respond reasonably to the  Government’s statement calling for objectivity and sensitivity with unnecessary prejudiced  brashness, once again using the issue to hit out at managers that the senior leaders of the union  have repeatedly voiced their discontent with for reasons apparently arising from earlier  disagreements when former union colleagues. 

Additionally, the NASUWT should note that when the Guzman report was commissioned,  individuals were asked to provide information on the basis that it was a fact-finding exercise. None  of those who provided information for that report were ever told that the report would be made  public, as it was put to them as an internal report. All The teachers who provided information did so  on that basis and had a Union representative from, ironically, NASUWT with them at their request  and the relevant teacher had her lawyer present with her as did the family of the pupil, who is now  an adult. 

However much oilthe teachers’ union irresponsibly seeks to insensitively pour on the flames of this  matter, the Government and the Department of Education will continue to work through the  internal review already announced. 

In the long term, that is what is in the best interests of the pupil in question (who is now an adult),  the relevant family and all other persons involved in this matter, and, in particular, the community  as a whole and the teaching body generally.