Front-line council employees in Powys have been subject to over 350 physical and verbal assaults in the last three years, an investigation has found.
Overall, almost half of the 2,619 reported assaults reported in Mid and North Wales took place on staff working at the region’s schools (1,193), leading to calls for more to be done to protect teachers and other educational support workers while performing their day to day duties.
A total of 353 assaults were reported in Powys, with many involving local schools.
The figures, obtained via freedom of information requests, revealed that the highest number of assaults took place in Gwynedd, where 838 incidents involving violence on council staff were reported between 2015/16 and 2017/18.
The General Secretary of teaching union, the NASUWT, has called for more safeguards to protect teaching staff.
Chris Keates said: “No teacher or
“Where a pupil is known to exhibit violent and disruptive behaviour, a risk assessment should be undertaken and action
She added: “In too many cases no effective assessment is ever undertaken. Even if it is, all too often this is not always shared with all staff or is not passed on to receiving schools if the pupil is moved.
“Employers who fail to disclose safety information leave themselves vulnerable to legal challenge and industrial action, but more importantly they are behaving recklessly with the health and wellbeing of staff and other pupils and this simply cannot be justified.”
Assaults reported in on council staff in Powys:
2015/16: 122
2016/2017: 130
2017/2018: 101