At a meeting of the Fife Council Education Scrutiny Committee, on a report detailing violent incidents in schools, the number of violent incidents has continued to increase. 

So far in 2023 up until the end of October 3,637 incidents were recorded, compared to 2,985 in the entirety of 2022. 

With 2022 already showing a sharp increase, Fife Liberal Democrat Deputy Leader Councillor James Calder raised concerns at the Committee that current policies are failing to protect pupils and staff.

Councillor Calder said,

Compared to 2017, violent incidents in Fife’s schools have tripled. It feels as though the situation is going out of control.

This is completely unacceptable and the victims of this violence are going to experience lifelong traumas in many cases.

I made this point as well as my concern that current policies are failing to address the problem.

While I understand the concerns of the Education Department that their policies are not being used uniformly around Fife’s schools, they must continue to look at solutions to this problem before it gets worse.