The investigator who led the probe into the death of Aberdeen schoolboy Bailey Gwynne has warned middle class parents that the tragedy could have taken place in any Scottish school – regardless of social class.
Andrew Lowe, who has been involved in a number of high-profile investigations across the UK including the Hillsborough disaster, was appointed to lead the review into the circumstances surrounding the killing of the Cults Academy pupil.
Bailey, 16, was stabbed in October last year by a fellow pupil at the academy, which is one of the top ranked state schools in the country.
His killer, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was locked up for nine years after he was found guilty of culpable homicide earlier this year.
In his lengthy 17,000-word report which was published earlier this month, Mr Lowe made 21 key recommendations to reduce the risk of another violent attack in Scotland’s schools.
The report found that Bailey’s death could have been “potentially predictable and avoidable”, but his teachers were not to blame.
Mr Lowe has warned that the stabbing could have occurred anywhere in Scotland: “This tragedy has revealed these incidents don’t only happen in inner cities and troubled neighbourhoods.
“My message would be this: it is you in the schools, who think this has nothing to do with you, who need to listen.
“A school is a community, and pupils and teachers and auxiliary staff all have a duty to each other to make sure school is safe.
“One of the things about this tragedy was people knew this young man carried weapons, but did not think it necessary to inform teachers.”
It has also been revealed that Aberdeen City Council does not have its own centralised log of pupils found with knives.
However, a spokesman for the council’s chief officers group said the authority is working on a better way of documenting incidents involving blades.
The spokesman said: “As part of ongoing work, we have developed a centralised system to record whether a weapon was recovered and are working on implementing the recommendations of the review into the death of Bailey Gwynne.”
