A headteacher who allowed one of the London Bridge terrorist attackers to teach pupils unsupervised has been banned from managing a school.
Sophie Rahman was struck off from being a teacher by a teacher conduct panel last summer after it was found she failed to protect children and left “pupils vulnerable to grooming for radicalisation” by allowing terrorist Khuram Butt to work at the school in a voluntary capacity.
Months later, he was shot dead by police along with two other attackers following the London Bridge attack on 3 June 2017, in which eight people died and 48 people were injured.
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Today, education secretary Damian Hinds has issued a further banning order stating that Rahman is unsuitable to take part in the management of any independent school, academy or free school, under section 128 of the Education and Skills Act 2008.
The decision document states: “The panel found that she failed to safeguard pupils and deliberately misled the police and local authority when they made enquiries into Khuram Butt’s involvement at the school.”
The teacher conduct panel heard that Ms Rahman took on Khuram Butt after he approached the Eton Community School, in Ilford, formerly known as Ad-Deen Primary School - an independent Muslim day school for pupils between the ages of 3 and 11, which was closed down in August 2017.
Ms Rahman, who was headteacher and proprietor, took him on in a voluntary position as an Arabic memorisation teacher at an after-school club, but she ought to have known or “or had a reasonable opportunity to become aware” that he was connected to Al-Muhajiroun - a proscribed extremist jihadist network.
A Department for Education spokesperson said: “Teachers, leaders and governors have a responsibility to keep children safe and Sophie Rahman failed to do that. That’s why, as part of our duty to prevent such individuals from working in our schools, we have issued this order today.”
Ms Rahman has three months to appeal.
