Figures released under the Freedom of Information Act show some £2.25m in compensation was awarded to pupils last year after local councils admitted liability for school accidents.
In one of the biggest single pay-outs, a pupil from Surrey won £29,000 from the local authority after sitting on a radiator and suffering burns.
A student in Doncaster was handed £2,000 in compensation after being affected by exposure to bright light during a science experiment.
Poole Council paid £33,500 to settle a claim from a pupil who missed the high jump landing mat during a PE lesson.
In some cases, attempts to minimise injuries still failed to prevent successful claims.
Wakefield Council paid out £3,275 after a child was hit in the eye with a “safe” foam javelin, while officials in North Lincolnshire spent £4,500 to settle a claim against a student who was injured after falling off an exercise bike.
Frank Furedi, professor of sociology at Kent University, said the compensation culture was ruining children’s education.
“Some school authorities opportunistically use the threat of litigation as an excuse to avoid the hassle of organising trips and activities,” he said.
“Demanding compensation from schools and other public sector bodies is immoral; it is a demand for you and I and other taxpayers to cough up the cash.
“The Government should ban litigation against the public sector and find other ways of holding individual to account in education and health.”
A survey of 140 out of 150 local education authorities in England revealed almost 400 successful claims were made in the last academic year. Awards are often being inflated by expensive legal fees.
One claim brought against Bexley Council in London ended with a pupil being handed £1,000 for a glue gun burn, while the child’s solicitor gained £7,250. The council also spent £1,650 on its own legal advice.
Drink burns also accounted for a large proportion of the total.
Middlesbrough Council paid £11,000 when a student was scalded by a hot drink knocked off a teacher’s desk, Gloucestershire Council paid £3,700 to a pupil injured by hot tea and Kirklees Council spent £2,000 to settle a claim by a pupil who was burnt by soup.
Other pay-outs included:
John Ransford, chief executive of the Local Government Association, said: “Where people have a legitimate claim for compensation it’s important they are able to get the damages they’re entitled to, and that the organisation involved is able to learn from anything that went wrong.
“There is a real fear that the presence of no-win-no-fee lawyers encourages some people to chance their arm, clogging up the system with spurious claims that cost a substantial amount of taxpayers’ money.
“The money spent investigating and handling compensation claims is valuable funding which could otherwise be spent on front line services to help and support all residents.”
--By Graeme Paton,26 Sep 2010