A headteacher who was suspended for suggesting staff were sat at home ‘doing nothing’ during lockdown has stood by her comments.

Pauline Wood, head of Grange Park primary school in Sunderland for 15 years, is being investigated for allegedly bringing it into disrepute during an interview with BBC Radio about the wider reopening of primary schools.

When asked if parents were right that not all schools were working hard amid the coronavirus closures, Wood said said she agreed ‘to some extent’.

‘You can’t lump everyone together as if they are all one type…some teachers are coming up with the most imaginative, amazing things…and other people do sit at home doing nothing. I won’t defend those people’ she said.

When pressed whether that included teachers at her own school, Wood said: ‘Yes, I think it’s time we talked about the elephant in the room in some of this.’

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Wood said there was only so much headteachers could do to motivate staff, saying attitudes to work ultimately come down to individuals. ‘It looks very simplistic, but you’ve got lots of HR rules, regulations, unions and people can say all reasons why they can and can’t work’ she said.

In the same interview she added: ‘Some teachers have been in [schools], but many have not been in at any time. Safety is paramount, but don’t make out teachers have all been working flat out.’

Wood said she was suspended three days after giving the interview on June 12. She claimed the school governor told her the action was being taken due to her ‘bringing the school into disrepute’.

Speaking to the Daily Telegraph this week, Wood said she made the comments after a minority of staff refused to work in the school, which remained open for vulnerable children and children of key workers, for three days a week, rather than two.

She said she believed headteachers around the country would agree with her but were scared of backlash from unions if they spoke out.

Wood, who was due to resign from her role in August, said: ‘I have broad shoulders, I am not going to lie. But the barrier for most heads is too great. There is a lot of pressure to toe the party line and there are lots of heads who think it is not worth putting their heads above the parapet.’

Wood said her resignation was a bitter pill to swallow given her success on transforming the school from inadequate to outstanding. Grange Park is based in one of the most deprived areas of the country, with about 40% of pupils on free school meals.

During an 2011 Ofsted inspection, which rated the school as ‘Outstanding’, officials said the ‘relentless’ way Wood and her leadership team pursue excellence and improvement has an extremely positive impact on pupils’ outcomes’.

The school is now in the top 2% nationally for phonics and maths Key Stage 2.

Several parents leapt to Wood’s defence on Twitter, praising her ‘integrity and principled stand’.

Wood thanked people for the support she received, saying it was the job of headteachers ‘to hold staff to account’.

She claimed to have endured ‘two weeks of grief’ from governors and local authority officials but said ‘our children, parents and most staff are worth it’.

Chair of Grange Park school governors Mary Hodgson said that she could not comment on personal circumstances as it would be a ‘breach of confidentiality’. 

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