Mr Alan Harbottle

Introduction

Mr Alan Harbottle was a class teacher at Mosspits Lane Primary School in Liverpool, where he had taught since 2011 and had served as a safeguarding officer for a number of years. In late May 2023 he struck up an online conversation with someone he believed to be a 14-year-old boy who was in fact a police decoy, exchanged sexualised photographs and arranged to meet. Arrested on 31 May 2023, he was convicted at Southend on Sea Magistrates’ Court on 1 June 2023 of attempting to engage in sexual communication with a child and attempting to meet a boy under 16 following grooming. A Teaching Regulation Agency panel found the allegations proven, and in March 2025 the Secretary of State prohibited him from teaching indefinitely, with no prospect of restoration.

Background Information

Mr Harbottle joined Mosspits Lane Primary School as a class teacher on 1 September 2011. The panel noted that he had been a safeguarding officer, so he breached the boundaries he was charged with upholding despite full knowledge of his obligations. The decision records no earlier concerns: there was no evidence he had previously been subject to disciplinary proceedings or warnings, and the sentencing judge described him as a dedicated teacher of hitherto good character. His employment ended after the school suspended him on 5 June 2023 and dismissed him following a disciplinary hearing on 15 September 2023.

The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation

According to the sentencing remarks, in around late May 2023 Mr Harbottle began a conversation on a legal internet dating application with someone he believed to be over the age of 18. It quickly became apparent that the other party, a decoy police officer, purported to be 14, and the conversation moved to a more private forum. Sexualised photographs were exchanged at Mr Harbottle’s behest, and the discussion led swiftly to talk of “specific and highly intimate sexual behaviour”. Before the panel, Mr Harbottle admitted that he had communicated with Essex Police officers posing as a 14-year-old boy, that this had involved the exchange of sexualised nude images and discussion of sexual acts, and that he had organised a meeting with the boy as he believed.

He was arrested on 31 May 2023 for sexual communication with a child and appeared in court on 1 June 2023, when he was convicted at Southend on Sea Magistrates’ Court of attempting to engage in sexual communication with a child contrary to the Sexual Offences Act 2003 s15A(1), and of attempting to meet a boy under 16 years of age following grooming contrary to the Sexual Offences Act 2003 s15. He admitted the facts in a signed statement of agreed facts dated 24 October 2024, and the panel accepted the certificate of conviction as conclusive proof of the convictions and the facts they implied.

The judge’s sentencing remarks were unflinching: “It’s clear that you knew what you were doing, you made that obvious by the sense of some form of self-awareness during the course of those exchanges, and obviously that what you were doing was wholly wrong…” He added that “nonetheless, you persisted, and so it was that you went to meet, what you believed to be, a 14-year-old boy… It must have been in your head, that there was a possibility you might have sexual activity with him…”. Mr Harbottle received 10 months’ imprisonment suspended for 24 months, was ordered to complete a 30-day sexual offender programme and a 25-day rehabilitation activity requirement, and was made subject to a 10-year notification period and a sexual harm prevention order for 10 years.

The panel found the allegations proven, noting that he had sought to meet a child he had groomed despite having been a safeguarding officer. The judge did accept genuine remorse, credited his guilty pleas and saw a significant prospect of rehabilitation. Mr Harbottle told the school he “expected to be dismissed and barred from teaching based on [his] actions”, and wrote to the presenting officer calling it an “open and shut case. I committed a crime and was convicted, this makes me unsuitable to remain in the teaching profession. I should be debarred.”

Public Reaction and Consequences

The panel identified a strong public interest in the safeguarding and wellbeing of pupils, and considered that public confidence in the profession could be seriously weakened if such conduct were not treated with the utmost seriousness. It found that Mr Harbottle’s behaviour fundamentally breached the standard of conduct expected of a teacher, not least because he engaged in it despite years as a safeguarding officer, and that publishing the adverse findings alone would unacceptably compromise the public interest. It therefore recommended a prohibition order with immediate effect, without a review period, his dereliction of safeguarding duties weighing heavily. On 11 March 2025, decision maker Marc Cavey, acting for the Secretary of State, agreed that prohibition was proportionate and in the public interest.

Current Status

Mr Alan Harbottle is prohibited from teaching indefinitely and cannot teach in any school, sixth form college, relevant youth accommodation or children’s home in England. The decision maker went further than usual, ruling that he shall not be entitled to apply for restoration of his eligibility to teach, which removes the customary route back to the classroom. The order takes effect from the date it is served on him, and he retains a right of appeal to the King’s Bench Division of the High Court within 28 days of being given notice. The panel had concluded that a review period would be inappropriate given the severity of offences with such obvious relevance to working with children.

Impact on Their Career/Life

A career that began at Mosspits Lane Primary School in September 2011 ended with dismissal in September 2023 and a permanent ban from the profession. The prohibition order prevents him from teaching anywhere in England, and with no entitlement to apply for restoration, the bar is lifelong. Alongside the teaching ban stand the criminal consequences imposed in June 2023: the suspended sentence of imprisonment, the 10-year notification requirements and the 10-year sexual harm prevention order. The panel judged that the public interest outweighed any interest in retaining him, whatever ability as an educator he may have had.

Sources

• Teaching Regulation Agency, “Teacher misconduct panel outcome: Mr Alan Harbottle” — source