This week 30 years ago: Parents fight Clerkenwell school after head’s court case
Islington Gazette: April 29, 1988 - Credit: Archant
Parents were fighting Clerkenwell Parochial School after the return of its headmaster following seven months’ suspension.
Hugh Jenkins, 56, was allowed to return to work after being acquitted by a jury at Southwark Crown Court earlier that year.
He had been charged with “importuning” in a public lavatory at St Pancras station.
Parents objected to his return, claiming the school, in Amwell Street, had been better run in his absence.
They denied it was because the trial revealed he was gay.
Sue Watson organised a protest which saw 50 pupils withdrawn from school for the first week of the new term.
Mums organised alternative classes on the Margery Street Estate.
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They returned at the start of the second week, but Ms Watson said: “Our fight goes on.
“We are are looking at other ways of achieving our aim of forcing the Inner London education Authority and the governors to listen to us.”
