Call for security guards at school gates after stabbing

The onus to do a daily check for knives in the bag of a 14-year-old girl convicted of attempted murder should not have been put on her father, Plaid Cymru's education spokesperson has said.

The teenager, who cannot be named, was found guilty of the attempted murder of three people after the attack at a school in Carmarthenshire in April last year.

Cefin Campbell MS, whose brother works at the school and tried to restrain the girl, said searching pupils and employing security guards were options for schools to consider.

"I don't think the onus should have been put on the father to check the bag every day," he told BBC Radio Wales Breakfast.

Campbell also called for "better collaboration in the information shared between social services and school leaders".

He said "clearly the person was a troubled individual, that came out in court. We need to ask about support for mental health issues".

The teenager was found guilty of the attempted murder of teachers Fiona Elias and Liz Hopkin and a pupil at Ysgol Dyffryn Aman in April 2024.

They were all taken to hospital after the attack.

The defendant is due to be sentenced on 28 April.

Campbell said while he did not really know what the answer was, it needed careful attention because knife crime and violence against teachers had increased since the Covid-19 pandemic.

He said "searching pupils is one solution" to prevent such an incident from happening again but he questioned "whether teachers want to play that role of playing security guard as well as being teachers".

Fiona Elias, left, and Liz Hopkin were stabbed along with a pupil

He warned this could lead to confrontations and said another option might be for schools to employ "specialist security guards".

Campbell said "teachers shouldn't feel threatened in any way", adding teaching unions needed to be consulted on any plans to ask teachers to check bags.

"What we don't want to do is to go down the road of some American states and cities where there are scanners and body scanners for everyone going into school every day metal detectors," he said.

He said pupils as young as year two - aged six and seven - carrying knives was "an extremely sad indictment of our society and I have no doubt that social media plays a part in this as well".

Security would 'no doubt help'

A Welsh government spokesperson said: "Any form of violence against staff and pupils in schools is completely unacceptable."

They said they would be holding a round table meeting with police and the local council "to discuss these issues and what lessons we can take".

Steve Mitchell, who is a supply teacher in Rhondda Cynon Taf and a representative of the National Educational Union Cymru, had a knife pulled on him by a pupil in class a few years ago.

He said security in schools would "no doubt help" but questioned how it would be paid for.

"Schools are so tight for money....they can't even afford to replace teachers," he said.

He added: "The threat of violence in some schools is always there and it's the pressure that the teachers are under not knowing if they're going to come out of a lesson safely and that is why they're looking for other jobs."

Existing Welsh government legislation says "reasonable force" may be used without pupils' consent to search for weapons.

Former teacher Emlyn Jones, who now runs a security firm, said the climate had been changing in schools and within society over the last few years and "many more knives are being carried and used".

He said that employing security staff at schools "would be an option but it's not something that's going to look good arriving at schools and seeing security officers.

"It is happening in larger cities across England - some in south Wales - but there is a cost to that."

"If someone wants to have knives in school, they could throw it over a hedge or hide the knife at night so that's not going to stop everyone bringing a knife to school," he added.

Ioan Rhys Jones, secretary general of the UCAC education union, welcomed the Welsh government's announcement of a round table meeting but warned that "to push it down the road for months is not good enough".

He said there had been particular challenges regarding behaviour in schools over the past five years or so and authorities needed to listen to what teachers were saying.

He said teachers probably did need to be checking bags on a regular or daily basis, adding: "I know students have rights, but we need to make sure the rights to safety is paramount."

Additional reporting by Antonia Matthews