I watched a programme recently which had been recorded at a York school. It was called The Big Questions. One of the invited audience was a Press letter writer, David Quarrie.

Three questions were put to the audience, one of which was: “Would bringing the cane back make for better behaviour in schools?” In my opinion, Mr Quarrie was one of the few speakers who made sense.

As he has been a teaching assistant, he did know what he was talking about.

His feeling was, and mine, that the plight of teachers is becoming more and more desperate and any weapon added to their sadly-depleted armoury would be welcome. I was amazed that the general feeling of the “experts” there was the opposite.

How can we sit by and watch our best teachers, truly the lifeblood of the education service and also the working lives of generations of young people, leave because they feel undervalued, unsupported, and facing a rising tide of pupils who can cause mayhem in school without reasonable but tough, meaningful retribution?

Yet that is what is happening. Not that long ago, teachers felt respected and in control but if, as David Davis stated, the cane has been outlawed in the European Union, then surely somebody, somewhere, should be able to offer a working alternative.

Teachers should be the main people consulted on this, and should not be expected to do a thankless and powerless job, watching their lives, as well as those of youngsters who actually want to learn, being ruined for lack of discipline. The biggest problem teachers face now is that pupils actually threaten to report them to their parents, instead of teachers and parents being on the same side. Something has gone sadly wrong with society when this is the case. Heather Causnett, Escrick Park Gardens, Escrick, York.



• The Big Questions, a talk programme screened earlier this month on BBC1 which came from York, featured frequent Press letter writer David Quarrie. The debate was about corporal punishment in our schools of today.

Mr Quarrie reminisced on his schooldays and receiving the cane and said it should be brought back to instil some discipline back into our schools.

I wholeheartedly agree with his thoughts. Anyone with half a brain knew exactly what would happen back in 1977 when corporal punishment was abolished in state schools.

The rest is history, with the “you cannot lay a finger on me whatever I do” attitude among the lesser intellects and badly brought up individuals.

One lady in the audience of the programme mentioned smugly that it would never be reintroduced, as Britain was part of the European Union.

I would say never say never; we only need a Government of this country to at last realise what damage being part of the EU has done to Britain and get out once and for all.

I too remember first being caned in primary school, a choice of canes, then six of the best on each palm, and for the life of me cannot remember now what I did to deserve them. But, as they say, it never did me any lasting harm. It was very interesting to note that the studio audience who disagreed with corporal punishment had no alternative remedies of keeping order in schools, and a few trotted out the expected lines, such as the recipients of caning today would see it as a badge of honour.

What a load of poppycock. It would be the last thing on their minds, and one certainly would not tell one’s parents for fear of further punishment.

Bob Waite, Holgate, York.