Teachers convicted of sexual abuse or child pornography won’t be allowed back in the classroom for at least five years under new legislation being introduced Wednesday afternoon by Education Minister Liz Sandals.

“We know that the vast majority of our teachers are professionals . . . But in those rare circumstances when discipline is required, it is important for Ontario families to be confident in the action that is taken,” Sandals said in a written statement before announcing the changes.

“This proposed legislation will strengthen the authority of the Ontario College of Teachers to take action, while ensuring the process is open and transparent for everyone involved.”

The law will mean that teachers can’t apply to return to the classroom for five years, though they can appeal the loss of their teaching certificate in court.

The legislation also forces school boards to alert the college, which governs the province’s teachers, when a teacher has been disciplined or fired for misconduct.

It would also push disciplinary hearings through the system faster, and see all decisions publicly posted.

The changes were brought about after a Star series revealed secrecy surrounding disciplinary hearings at the college, as well as issues of accountability and transparency. The college then called in former justice Patrick LeSage to look at its practices, including “whether the college’s communication and publication practices prior to and following a hearing meet current standards of transparency.”

The Star uncovered teachers who had abused students but whose identities were not made public; teachers who sometimes faced little in terms of discipline. Some were suspended for short periods of time, others simply moved to another school — a practice commonly known as “passing the trash.”

LeSage made 49 recommendations, and those that did not require legislative change have already been put in place. The rest are to be introduced by Education Minister Liz Sandals Wednesday in the Ontario Legislature.

At the end of 2011, then-education minister Laurel Broten said that entire decisions on disciplinary hearings would be posted on the College’s website starting in 2012.

Prior to that, summaries of some cases were published in the College’s magazine, without names, even though the teacher had been punished.

At the time, Broten said she was looking into mandatory punishments for some offences. Such changes had been recommended in the past to the College, but were ignored.

LeSage examined the workings of the College over a nine-month period, and released his 76-page report last year.

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

One of his recommendations was that teachers guilty of sexual offences should “almost invariably” lose their teaching certificate.

The government’s legislation would also clearly define “sexual misconduct,” something that currently does not exist. Such misconduct, however, would not mean an automatic loss of a teacher’s licence, though that is one of the possible punishments.