A primary school teacher has been banned from teaching after she was caught drinking alcohol on the school grounds.

Alison Atkins, who worked at Copperfield Academy in Dover Road East, Gravesend, was found guilty of unacceptable professional conduct after fellow staff members spotted her drinking “from a long-neck bottle in her car” at lunchtime on May 12 last year.

Ms Atkins, who had worked at the school since September 2021, was suspended on medical grounds after she was confronted and produced the empty wine bottle.

At a professional conduct panel of the Teaching Regulation Agency on June 11, members heard that Ms Atkins had consistently admitted to having drunk a bottle of wine on the school premises during the school day.

During the investigation interview, Ms Atkins said it was lunchtime and she was feeling anxious, so she went to her car and had a small bottle of wine.

She said she was called into the office afterwards and questioned after staff members had spotted her.

She then went to her car and showed them a can of Coke, before deciding to come clean and produce the empty bottle of wine.

‘I have had to consider that the public has a high expectation of professional standards of all teachers’

Ms Atkins, who was not at the hearing, admitted during an interview to drinking more than one bottle a night at home and stated that while she had not been drinking in school she had gone off-site at lunchtime to have an alcoholic drink.

Witness statements confirmed that two members of staff who saw Ms Atkins drinking from the bottle also saw “two bottles that had a percentage of alcohol label on the back of the overturned bottle” behind the seat in her car and said they were very confident these were the same bottles they had seen Ms Atkins drink from.

The hearing was told a staff member confirmed they were not aware of any major concerns regarding Ms Atkins’ performance or conduct before the incident and that she often went to her car to have her lunch, but that was usual practice for many teachers.

Ms Atkins had confessed to drinking four miniature bottles of wine per day and to further instances of leaving site during the school day to drink.

However, the panel did not have evidence of any previous instances of drinking on school premises.

The decision was made to ban Ms Atkins from teaching with the opportunity for a review in two years.

Making a decision on behalf of the secretary of state for education, Sarah Buxcey concluded Ms Atkins was guilty of breaching teaching standards and should be banned from teaching.

“I have had to consider that the public has a high expectation of professional standards of all teachers and that the public might regard a failure to impose a prohibition order as a failure to uphold those high standards.

“In weighing these considerations, I have had to consider the matter from the point of view of an ‘ordinary intelligent and well-informed citizen’.”

A spokesperson for Copperfield Academy said: “We set high standards and have clear expectations of our staff at Copperfield and across REAch2 academy trust.

“In this case, this individual demonstrated unacceptable professional conduct and we took action immediately: suspending the member of staff and making referrals to the local authority and the Teachers Regulation Agency. We terminated their employment with the school following an investigation.

“Whilst situations like this are extremely rare, we understand it is upsetting news for our school community. We work hard to ensure that Copperfield is a warm and nurturing environment in which every child thrives, and we will always do everything in our power to protect that.”