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Islington Tribune - by ROISIN GADELRAB
Published: 3 October 2008

School bullies’ anti-gay taunts

EDUCATION chiefs must investigate a sharp rise in homophobic bullying incidents in Islington schools, a report has urged.
The call was made in an Islington Council scrutiny report, which revealed there was a 44 per cent rise in homophobic bullying incidents in the borough’s schools last term.
Figures produced at Tuesday’s council overview committee meeting reveal that there were also 158 racist incidents in schools in the borough – up from 113 in autumn last year, with the majority of incidents being in primary schools.
The report showed cases of harassment on the grounds of disability and religion/belief remained consistently low, with fewer than 10 incidents per term, apart from an unexplained peak in autumn 2006, when the figure shot up to 51.
Lib Dem education chief Councillor Ursula Woolley said the figures reflected changes in the way bullying was categorised.

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