Cameron targets class troublemakers

With teacher surveys suggesting that a third of teachers have been physically attacked and nearly one in five have been threatened with a weapon, he will say that Britain's schools are facing a "severe discipline problem".

At the same time, he will say that the ability of teachers to deal with violent pupils is constrained by a spreading "no touch" culture, which forbids teachers to touch pupils in any way.

Under the Tory plans, the authority of headteachers will be strengthened by ending the right of pupils to appeal against exclusion from school to an independent appeals panel.

New rules requiring good schools to take pupils expelled from bad ones, would be abolished - as would the rules imposing financial penalties on schools if they expel students.

The Tories would also scrap the requirement on schools to organise teaching for pupils they have excluded from the sixth day of exclusion.

The argue that it simply creates an incentive either to suspend for less than six days or expel permanently while placing a major additional burden on teachers.

Shadow children's secretary Michael Gove said: "Bad behaviour is preventing teachers teaching and children learning and it is the poorest children that are worst affected.

"We need to get persistent and unrepentant troublemakers out of the classroom and give teachers the protection they need to keep order."

Schools Minister Jim Knight dismissed the Tory proposals as "gimmicks" which had not been properly thought through.