Tariq Majid Qureshi

Introduction

Dr Tariq Majid Qureshi taught mathematics at St Anne’s R.C. High School in Stockport on a temporary contract between September and December 2018. In February 2022 a Teaching Regulation Agency professional conduct panel found that he was convicted at Minshull Street Crown Court on 2 December 2019 of three offences of assault by beating against a pupil — offences committed on school premises during school hours — and that the conduct behind the conviction, which included calling the pupil his favourite, beautiful and gorgeous, squeezing her face, hugging her, kissing her head and putting his hand under her desk to touch her leg, was sexually motivated. The panel also found he had concealed a previous prohibition order from the school. Qureshi attended the hearing unrepresented, admitted four of the five allegations and denied sexual motivation — a denial the panel rejected. Decision maker John Knowles banned him from teaching for life with no review period.

Background Information

Qureshi was recruited through a supply agency in May 2018 and moved onto a temporary contract that September. In October 2018 the pupil made a disclosure to staff members that he had made her feel uncomfortable: she told the school he would squeeze her face, call her beautiful and gorgeous, tell her she was his favourite, kiss her on the head, hug her and touch her leg. He was escorted off the school premises the same day and his employment subsequently ended. A police investigation followed, and it discovered that Qureshi had behaved similarly at a different school — the earlier record that mattered most to the regulatory case. Before the Stockport appointment, Qureshi had been subject to a previous prohibition order arising from misconduct the panel found similar, which had been set aside in 2017. On the school’s application form, asked whether he had ever been subject to child protection concerns or disciplinary action including any time-expired, he answered “No” — and accepted at the hearing that he should have answered yes. He was convicted on his own confession at Minshull Street Crown Court in December 2019 and sentenced on 7 January 2020 to a twelve-month community order, a fifteen-day rehabilitation activity requirement and an £85 victim surcharge.

The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation

Convicted of three assaults on a pupil; panel found the conduct sexually motivated and a repeated pattern of grooming; prior concealed prohibition; banned for life with no review. Qureshi admitted the conviction, the conduct, the concealment and the dishonesty, but denied sexual motivation — the panel rejected that denial on the evidence.

The panel accepted the certificate of conviction and the trial transcript, which named the pupil and recorded that the offences were committed while he was her maths teacher. On the contested motivation allegation, Qureshi gave oral evidence that the leg touch was accidental — the back of his hand brushing her leg as he pulled up a chair — and that he used “beautiful” and “gorgeous” of canteen and other staff too. The panel disbelieved him: the pupil had told police he crouched down, put his right hand under the desk and touched her legs, and the panel found no reason for her to lie about it and noted on the documents that Qureshi had lied to the police, lies it found premeditated because he had prepared his statement before interview. Applying the case law on inference of sexual purpose, it found there was no other reason for placing his hand under a pupil’s desk than a sexual one, and concluded his words and actions were more likely than not sexual in purpose. On the concealment allegation it found his “No” answer dishonest by the standards of ordinary decent people, noting the application form question expressly captured time-expired matters. The panel described his misconduct as a repeated pattern of grooming.

Public Reaction and Consequences

The panel found a strong public interest in the protection of pupils given the serious findings of inappropriate conduct against a pupil in a school setting, in public confidence, and in proper standards. Witness A, a school witness, gave oral evidence about negative publicity and the reputational damage within the community the case caused the school. In Qureshi’s favour, the panel weighed that he said he deeply regretted his actions — but found he showed no insight into them, and noted no relevant evidence of good character was offered. The panel regarded the prior prohibition order, set aside in 2017, for similar misconduct as a decisive aggravating feature: he had not learnt from his previous failings. Buxcey — in this case decision maker John Knowles — placed considerable weight on the grooming-pattern finding, the dishonesty and the link between the assault convictions and violent behaviour, concluding that no review period was necessary to maintain public confidence. The published decision is the case’s main public record; the 2019 conviction attracted no substantive press coverage.

Current Status

Qureshi is prohibited from teaching indefinitely and cannot teach in any school, sixth form college, relevant youth accommodation or children’s home in England. Knowles decided he shall not be entitled to apply for restoration of his eligibility to teach, so the order has no review date — the four factors cited being the assault convictions and their link to violence, the sexual nature of the findings, the repeated-pattern-of-grooming finding and the dishonesty. The order takes effect from service, with a right of appeal to the Queen’s Bench Division of the High Court within 28 days of notice. His criminal sentence — the twelve-month community order imposed in January 2020 — was discharged years before the regulatory hearing; the hearing itself weathered procedural fights over late evidence, with the panel refusing to admit the pupil’s video interview as unfair to admit at such a late stage, and refusing his own late character references and medical letter as not current. The panel’s determination is dated 3 February 2022, with Knowles’s order dated 7 February 2022.

Impact on Their Career/Life

The case is the TRA stream’s clearest recent example of what a set-aside prohibition order cannot shield: Qureshi’s earlier ban had been lifted in 2017, yet the same category of conduct — familiarity language, physical contact, a pupil made uncomfortable — resurfaced within a year of his return to classrooms and ended in a criminal conviction. The concealment finding is the mechanism the regime relies on: had his application form answer been honest, the school would never have employed him, and the panel’s dishonesty conclusion converted a safeguarding failure into a second knowing breach. For schools hiring former teachers with history, the decision records why time-expired questions exist and what answering them falsely costs. For Qureshi, the second prohibition carries the regime’s only truly permanent outcome — no review, no restoration — because the panel found the earlier ban had taught nothing; the grooming-pattern language places him in the cohort of teachers the regulator treats as structurally unsafe around children.

Sources

• Dept for Education, “Teacher misconduct panel outcome: Dr Tariq Majid Qureshi” — source