Some heads prefer to keep difficult pupils in school

But although the school was re-launched and has a new, glossy name, its reputation remains badly tarnished.

Dick Boland, of the National Union of Teachers, described an experience told to him by one of his member.

"He was teaching his lesson and suddenly a boy burst in, not one of his class, but this was a boy who wanted to be with his mates," Mr Boland said.

"The teacher summoned the patrol teacher who should be on duty at all times.

"Now the patrol teacher wasn't able to get there for 20 minutes because he was dealing with other incidents, so the lesson for all of the rest of those youngsters was disrupted for the whole of that 20 minutes."

'End of the road'

Last March, six months after the school's "fresh start", Mr Garwood resigned.

Now it has emerged that part of his reason was that he wanted to permanently exclude 15 difficult pupils, but Brighton and Hove education authority refused to support him.

David Hawker, Brighton's chief education officer, said: "The LEA does support the exclusion of pupils where that is the end of the road, where everything else has been tried within the school.

"What you don't want to do is to go immediately to exclusion the moment there's a problem."

Head teachers who were too ready to exclude pupils were often not very good at their jobs, he said.

"You need to ask the question what are you doing to educate the pupils you have in your care effectively, what have you got in terms of the grit and determination to ensure that every child gets a decent education in your school."

There's no doubt, Tony Garwood was no superhead. Ofsted inspectors said he lacked authority when they condemned the school as failing.

Difficult balance

But Mr Boland believes that does not mean the exclusions were unnecessary

"Of course any school does need good effective and strong management and leadership, but some of the youngsters with whom our members are dealing are really seriously, persistently disruptive," he said.

"I have to question whether the best head teacher in the world could deal with a situation like that."

Clive Frost is the new temporary head teacher of the school.

He is very reluctant to permanently exclude difficult pupils, preferring to send them under special supervision to a withdrawal room.

The Conservative leader William Hague recently argued that avoiding exclusions means putting the interests of a disruptive minority above the interests of the well-behaved.

The balance is frustratingly difficult to achieve.