Teacher in ‘haunted cupboard joke’ with pupil unfairly dismissed
A teacher who locked a misbehaving pupil in a store cupboard, that was rumoured to be haunted, has won his claim of unfair dismissal.
Mr Mohammad Basit taught maths at Pleckgate High School in Blackburn from 2012. He had an unblemished record and was known for his self-professed ‘love of his job’.
However, an incident in January 2020 led to him being dismissed from his role.
Mr Basit had ordered a disruptive pupil to stand at the back of the classroom next to a store cupboard as punishment. The pupil continued to misbehave and Basit suggested he should go inside the cupboard.
The pupil did so, before Mr Basit ordered him to come back out to the classroom.
After the lesson the pupil went to see the school headteacher, Mr Cocker, and made a complaint against Mr Basit, along with another couple of pupils who had also been disciplined during the lesson.
A couple of days later Mr Basit was approached by the deputy head and asked to make a statement about the incident, but was not told about the allegations against him, or how seriously the school was treating it.
However, Mr Basit was not allowed to go and teach his next lesson. He was made to wait in the staffroom for an hour before Mr Cocker and HR operations manager Ms McGonagle told him he was being suspended on full pay pending an investigation.
Of the 17 pupils that were present in the lesson in question, 13 gave statements although their version of events were inconsistent.
Mr Basit remained adamant that the incident was a joke, and that the pupil had even commented himself that the cupboard was ‘quite cosy’. He also noted that the pupil’s own disciplinary record had not been considered at any point. He had 364 entries on his behaviour record for abusing staff and pupils and disrupting classes.
However, Mr Basit was dismissed from his position for gross misconduct.
He took the case to the Employment Tribunal, which ruled in his favour.
It was noted that Mr Basit had always used ‘light humour’ in his teaching style and had a running joke that the cupboard was ‘haunted’. His statement of the events had also only been quickly written before he expected to teach another lesson, and he had not been given adequate time to prepare such a crucial piece of evidence.
The tribunal also noted that at no point in the investigation had it been acknowledged that the pupil had an appalling behavioural record, as did the other two that made the allegations against Mr Basit.
Between the three of them, there were 1,705 incidents for dishonesty, abuse to teachers and pupils, and disruption to lessons.
The tribunal concluded that given the ‘seriousness of the allegations against Basit and the implications for his career … the most thorough and careful of investigations was required’ and that the school’s investigation ‘did not meet that standard’.
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Abdul Mohammad Basit Respondent and Education Partnership Trust
Employment Tribunal
Employment Judge Ord
1 July 2021