PUPILS as young as five will soon be placed on school 'hate registers' for making playground taunts, it emerged last night.
Any form of racist or homophobic bullying will go down on record at the school and the pupil responsible could be monitored throughout their school life.
Details of any incidents, however minor, will then be kept on a database by the local authority and made available to ministers to inform future anti-bullying campaigns.
Children's charities last night expressed concern that youngsters may be criminalised for simple playground banter.
Michele Elliott, of charity Kidscape, said: "Children are being criminalised and singled out from a very early age when they don't know what they're doing."
The extent of the new measures came to light after 10-year-old Peter Drury was told his name would be placed on a register at his primary school in Somerset and his behaviour monitored. It followed an accusation that he called a friend "gay boy".
His mother Penny Drury said she was called into the school and informed the incident would be registered and that her son's file monitored while he remained at Ashcombe Primary School, in Weston-super-Mare, Somerset.
She said: "He doesn't even understand about the birds and the bees, so how can he be homophobic?
"Peter is very naive boy who didn't know what he was doing and is now very upset that he is in trouble."
Many schools already voluntarily record any incidents of racist, homophobic or anti-disability bullying.
daily express
