Teachers call for ban on mobiles to curb bullying

Mobile phones brought into schools by children should be treated as "potentially offensive weapons" and banned from being used in the classroom, teachers said today.

Many schools have bowed to parental pressure for children to keep their mobiles on them in case of an emergency, despite mounting concern some pupils use them in class.

But the NASUWT teachers' union was today expected to demand that pupils be forced to hand them over to staff at the start of the day, for collection when they go home, even if that left parents infuriated.

The union believes drastic action is necessary to combat the "significant and growing" menace of " cyberbullying" of teachers by pupils.

Teachers are particularly concerned that footage taken on mobile phone cameras of teachers in class is being posted on websites such as Bebo by their pupils.

Graham Cluer, the NASUWT's national executive member for Croydon, said: "It can be really, really distressing for someone who finds themselves in this situation as there are so many ways it can happen."

In some cases, videos have surfaced on sites such as YouTube of teachers being verbally, even physically, abused by children, he said.

At one school, which the union refused to name, the NASUWT went as far as balloting members over industrial action because governors overturned the head's decision to expel a pupil who "bullied a teacher via email and internet".

The NASUWT wants ministers to agree to a change in the law to make it much more difficult to show footage of teachers being abused by their pupils, by imposing heavy fines on websites for allowing offensive clips.

The Government has so far refused but the NASUWT has vowed to maintain the campaign, after an online survey to gauge the problem sparked almost 100 responses in just five days.

Last year, the Government gave teachers the power to discipline their pupils offsite, as well as on the premises, if their actions threatened the school ' s reputat ion. The NASUWT's annual report for 2008 made clear the union's view that this power also applied in cyberspace.