It’s "PC gone mad" - that’s the claim from teachers who say they’re unable to deal with troubled and violent students under current child restraint rules.
The guidelines were introduced last year to provide more clarity to schools after seclusion rooms were banned.
Physical force can be used if there’s a serious and imminent risk to safety, like a child attacking someone. But teachers say there are other times they need to intervene and the rules don’t allow it.
Pat Newman, Hora Hora school principal and Te Tai Tokerau Principals Association President, says children have thrown tantrums and started ripping items of walls.
"One school reports about how a boy urinates in the classroom in front of all the kids because he’s annoyed," Mr Newman says.
But he says teachers can’t use any force to remove the disruptive child and instead the other, "well-behaved" children have to leave.
"This is PC gone mad - it's absolute coo-coo land," he says.
A teacher from Auckland's Western Springs College teacher, Melanie Webber, says it's a tough to know when you can act.
"Should I step in or could I be potentially facing charges for this? Losing my registration, losing my job, because I was wanting to keep people safe," she says.
The restraint guidelines clearly state teachers should avoid restraining a child when they are disrupting the classroom, using verbal threats, trying to leave the classroom or school without permission, and damaging or removing property.
"An example would be, say a student picks up my laptop and starts walking out of the room with it, if I stand in the doorway and say no you're not allowed to leave, that breaches the Education Act as it stands," Ms Webber says.
Another teacher, Judith Nel, who works with children with high needs, says restraint is sometimes necessary.
"If you don’t, then all the other children in that classroom are traumatised, and that’s what we’re forgetting," she says.
The Education Ministry says the guidelines do need to be clearer. It met with an Advisory Group last week and it says it "will continue to work with the Advisory Group with the intention of providing advice to the Minister on any updates to the guidelines by the end of the year."
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