Patrick Tobin, the chairman of this year's Headmasters' Conference, said family breakdown created more discipline problems in schools than anything else, including drug-taking and the misuse of alcohol. Mr Tobin also attacked the Government's emphasis on examination results and the three Rs in its education policy. Speaking a week after Tony Blair promised a green paper on the family, Mr Tobin, the principal of Daniel Stewart's and Melville College, Edinburgh said he was sceptical about the Government's plans. Mr Tobin said initial results of a survey of 240 HMC schools showed that family breakdown caused most of the serious problems involving pupils. Virtually every time the schools were up against a problem of suspension or expulsion, they said they were dealing with a home breakdown.
Schools are out of their depth.
There is no way that, single-handedly, they can solve this problem. They have to look to government to take the lead. The damage caused to children by marital break-up was a more profound and insidious threat than drugs to the happiness and well being of 500,000 pupils in the independent sector, he said. Mr Tobin, the principal of Daniel Stewart's and Melville College, Edinburgh, with more than 2,500 pupils, said the finding had emerged from a survey of the heads of the 240 leading schools that belong to conference. Top of the agenda for any government concerned to affirm the values of citizenship would be the rehabilitation of the family in British life, he said.