The owner of a food-shop called police after a teacher from Cotham School, Bristol, barred the students from entering the shop in their home time.
The owner claimed that the school deliberately put teachers on patrol like ‘bouncers’ to stop the pupils from entering grocery stores, food shops, and takeaways from 2:45 pm to 3:15 pm, despite the fact that it wasn’t their school time.
Watch to find out more of this issue below.
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The police were contacted after a teacher in high-visibility jacket entered a takeaway store to make the students leave the place at once. The store-owner said the instructor handed detentions to students who were present there and forced them to walk out.
The owner of Chilli Bellies, Neil D’Souza, complained that he was facing a huge loss in his business just because of the school’s staff who has been interfering by patrolling the shops and streets.
“They came in the shop and started telling off the children who were in there, handing out detentions, demanding that they leave,” said D’Souza.
“I’d taken the children’s money, their food was almost ready.
“I said I’d had enough and asked this teacher to leave. He argued with me, and then went and stood right on the doorstep. He was physically blocking the entrance.”
The offended man further accused the school’s operation of affecting his other customers too.
“They were intimidating the students, and this was intimidating to my normal customers too. He refused to move, that’s why I called the police,” he added.
The school administration admitted that school teachers supervise the parade of shops, however, they denied sending any staff member to the patrol.
Jabir Shar, another store owner, said the official ban on students would soon impel him to end his setup there.
Shar explained how the teachers’ patrol was affecting his reputation and making him suspicious before his customers.
He said: “They are misleading the children and parents. I have had parents come in and ask why their children are not allowed in here, they have been told we don’t want them in.
“We are a business and would like to carry on serving them. This has been going on for more than 20 days and I’m losing hundreds of pounds a day.
“If this continues I’m not sure I’ll be able to remain open. They have a teacher standing outside which makes our other customers suspicious about what’s going on.”
Responding to the statements, the business manager at Cotham School, Allison Crossland, said the school and its teachers have complete authority on their students whether it’s their school time or home time.
She added that they are given the authority of controlling their students’ activities throughout the day by Michael Andrew Gove in 2011.
Miss Crossland argued that the patrol was just meant for the betterment of pupils.
“We supervise the parade of shops there and all the way from the school to the bottom of Nine Tree Hill, it isn’t just these shops,” she said.
“It is only for half an hour from 2.45pm to 3.15pm, and it is done to ensure the safety of children on their way home from school.
“We have 1,600 pupils, and 400 of them come out of school and come this way and head towards Stokes Croft and on into St Paul’s.”
The matter hasn’t been resolved yet, as per the statement by a spokesperson for Avon and Somerset Police.
The spokesperson said: “Police were called just after 3.10pm on Thursday, November 28, by the owner of a takeaway reporting antisocial behavior at the entrance to his premises in Cotham Road South, which he said was preventing customers from entering.
“Officers attended and spoke to the parties involved. No offences were identified or disclosed.”
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