Scottish Parent Teacher Council

FAQ - Legal and Insurance

What should we do if we have a claim?

If an injury or incident occurs then the first step is to contact the SPTC office for an incident report form.

If a claim is made against you it is important that you do not enter into any discussion with the claimant or their representative. You should just let them know that you have reported it to your insurers who will be in contact with them.

Help please! What information should we keep confidential?

Confidentiality is about protecting named individuals. So, if someone contacts you about a problem, you can discuss the problem but not mention the name of the person in anyway unless they have agreed in advance that they are quite happy being named.

This is even more important if you are passing on a letter or email of complaint that you have received.

It is important that any personal details are blanked out first. However, some information which people think is confidential is not. For example, information on school funding is public information and can/should be shared with all parents, not kept secret under some mistaken idea that money matters should be kept confidential.

Last term our headteacher stopped us from holding primary school discos as she said there was too much risk of injury to children and there were not enough adults to supervise.

She would like us to start up "family games night". The children really loved the discos and have been asking us to start them again. I wonder whether the headteacher has a right to tell the PTA what they can and cannot do during an evening let of the school?

The legal position of the PTA is that it is a voluntary, independent organisation and it does not fall under the control/management of the school or the local authority. When you take out a let, you are in the same legal position as if you were the Women's Guild, i.e. the event is your responsibility and your only obligation to the authority is to abide by the contract you sign when you take out the let.

Obviously, when you run a disco you do need enough supervision to ensure that everything runs properly; you should have enough adults such that if one or two have to absent themselves to deal with a problem, there are still enough others to supervise the main event. However, if the discos are PTA events, then it is the PTA that is liable and responsible for the children, not the school, and it is not for the school to decide whether they take place or not.

Having said that, a family games night sounds like a really good idea as it might involve more parents and that is something that everyone is trying to do.

We are a small PTA who regularly run school discos for the children. Can you tell me who holds ultimate responsibility for the event?

We have been discussing issues such as guidelines for parent helpers at discos, including fire safety and supervision of children if a parent fails to collect them after the disco. As a PTA we have no access to children's records to get parental contact details & would need to rely on staff members for this, who may or may not be PTA members.

The first thing to clarify is that ALL the parents and teachers at your school are members of the PTA – whether they like it or not! Your committee is elected at the AGM to represent them.
If you hold an event and it is organised by the PTA, then the committee and others that help are responsible. That is why we advise PTAs to take out public liability insurance as a PTA does not come under any local authority insurance scheme. The public liability that SPTC provides as part of our membership covers PTAs for any incident that occurs as a result of decisions/actions/negligence by them. (This also covers any helpers). For example, at one of your discos a child spills a drink and it isn’t cleared up, then someone slips and hurts themselves; the insurance would cover you for any damages. Without insurance, the committee are personally liable.
We advise PTAs to take sensible precautions ie, be aware of where the fire exits are. As for parents not collecting their child – make it a condition when you sell tickets or send a letter via the school to all the parents with a tear-off slip for their contact details in case of emergency and you could ask them about the arrangements for collecting children ie are they allowed to walk home alone?

We run an after-school club which employs a play leader. We have an employer's liability certificate through SPTC. Do we have to keep old copies?

Legislation came into effect in 1999 that requires you to keep copies of these certificates for 40 years! This applies to any certificate issued after 1/1/1998. Don't panic if you haven't done this, but maybe you should find someone/somewhere to hold future copies.

Would you please explain what is meant by fidelity guarantee which is part of our SPTC membership/insurance?

This section of the policy provides protection against loss of Parent Council/PTA funds through misappropriation by either the treasurer or a committee/council member. The cover is for up to £3,000 for the treasurer and £500 for each committee member. In order to be valid this cover requires that your accounts have been independently audited (this does not have to be a professional auditor but it must be someone not on or related to the committee) and that all cheques have two signatures.

It is important to remember that although the treasurer is responsible for the accounts and banking, all Parent Council/PTA committee members are responsible for making sure that this is being done.

For more information look at our leaflet: Money matters.

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