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Thirty-five teachers have been prosecuted for sex offenses since January 2006, with 16 having been convicted, the education chief revealed yesterday.
Secretary for Education Michael Suen Ming-yeung told the Legislative Council that of the 11 who were cleared, four are still teaching. Four teachers are on trial and another four are appealing.
Legislator Paul Chan Mo-po pointed to reports that a teacher convicted of sex offenses was employed by another school to do non- teaching work while another was able to teach by using a new name.
Public concern was sparked last year after a former teacher at a primary school in Kowloon was jailed for 10 years after being found guilty of 11 counts of having sex with a female student.
Wong Kwun-yu, chairman of Hong Kong Federation of Education Workers, said: "Those teachers constitute a very small proportion of the profession, but we think the new measures released by Education Bureau last month cannot effectively stop them from undertaking teaching work."
The Education Bureau now requires candidates for teaching jobs to declare any criminal record to the school management during the recruitment process.
The bureau does not keep a record of sexual convictions in Hong Kong.
Even with the candidates' consent, it does not have the authority to provide schools with information on applicants' criminal records.
Hong Kong Professional Teachers Union president Fung Wai-wah suggested the government set up a centralized database, enabling school management to check criminal records for sexual offenses by employees.
The bureau is now considering implementing the recommendations of the Law Reform Commission to establish an administrative scheme for employers of persons engaged in child-related work to check whether a candidate has any previous convictions for sex offenses.
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Emil Luis
Pod Bruskou 7,
Prague,
Czech Republic
Last updated: October 08, 2010