School head hopeful of strikes deal

A school head hopes future strikes by teachers can be averted after their union agreed to fresh talks.

Norton Knatchbull Grammar School head Susanne Staab said she had brought in a negotiator to help resolve a row with 30 members of the NASUWT union.

Last week they went on strike over fears that A-level and GCSE class sizes could double, and that leaving staff would not be replaced in September.

They had been due to stage further walkouts at the Hythe Road school on Tuesday and Wednesday this week, but in a letter to parents Mrs Staab said progress was being made.

She wrote: “We have scheduled additional meetings with the union this week and have reason to believe that this may result in all strike action being called off.”

The school was affected this week by a strike carried out by the National Union of Teachers as part of a nationwide dispute over cuts to education funding, pay and working conditions.

The school remained open as normal, though some timetabled lessons had to be cancelled and replaced by “purposeful activities”. A paedophile has been given an eight-year extended jail term for attacks on a child more than 25 years ago.

Terry Hughes, 62, formerly of Stowting, thought he had escaped justice for his sordid crimes in the 1990s, including secretly groping his victim while her mother slept in the same bed.

But his victim had the courage to tell police officers of her ordeal in Folkestone.

And when police raided his home in East Anglia they discovered he had stored images on his computer of children in knickers.

Now a jury at Canterbury Crown Court has rejected his claim he did not have a sexual interest in children and convicted him for three indecent assaults.

A judge had given him a sixyear jail term and ordered him to serve at least four years before he could even apply for parole.

And Judge Simon James then added another two years, which Hughes has to serve on licence when he is finally released.

Prosecutor Christopher May revealed that Hughes was still searching for illegal child images