A THUG dad who attacked a female primary school headteacher when she suspended his son for swearing and racially abusing another pupil escaped jail yesterday.

Paul Stratford, 30, punched and forcefully shoved Zita McCormick in front of shocked staff, after a showdown over his eight-year-old son Brendan’s behaviour.

Stratford claimed he was protecting his son, who was left in tears after Mrs McCormick excluded him from Seven Fields Primary School.

She made the decision after a racist outburst which she claims was his third act of anti-social behaviour that week. Brendan had allegedly sworn in front of a group of Spanish visitors and racially abused a Somali boy.

Yesterday Stratford was handed a nine-month community order and ordered to pay £500 at Swindon Magistrates’ Court. Education campaigners criticised the sentence.

Stratford was convicted of assault last month following the incident on June 22 this year.

The court was told Brendan’s mother was called to collect her son after the alleged racist outburst at 9.30am – but Stratford arrived instead and demanded to see the head.

Mrs McCormick said he flew into a rage as she tried to explain the situation, shouting: “You called my son a f*cking thug."”

She told the earlier hearing: “Mr Stratford made two huge steps and actually punched and pushed me and said ‘Don’t tell my son off’. The punch came first and then it was a push. It was almost like a fist and a hand and I came backwards.

“I said ‘Don’t hit the headteacher’. It’s quite shocking and it’s very frightening.”

Pauline Lambert, prosecuting, said Stratford had been asked to calm down but had refused and then hit the headteacher, who he had never met before.

She said: “The caretaker stood in between them and she told him again to leave. Mr Stratford continued to shout and rant at her before he finally left.”

Stratford claimed he only grabbed and gently pushed away Mrs McCormick’s wagging finger from his son’s face, because he feared she could blind him.

He claimed: “She was uncontrollable, she was close to his eye. I was worried about her pointing him in the eye and blinding him. And that’s when I thought I needed to do something to protect my kid.

“So with my left hand on the right hand she was pointing with, I grabbed her fingers gently and pushed her backwards.”

Sentencing, chairman of the bench David Sinclair said: “You were found guilty of assault, that is an offence serious enough to make a community order.”

Stratford, of Toothill, Swindon, was ordered to pay £400 and £100 compensation.

Chris McGovern, chairman for the Campaign for Real Education and a former headteacher, said: “This assault happened in a school and that should make the offence more serious. It is a place where there are children – if schools aren’t safe then there is no hope.

“The children first witnessed the alleged bullying by this boy, then his father supporting him and then the father hitting the headteacher. It is simply unacceptable.

“This should have been an exemplary sentence to ensure that people are put off doing things like this. “A custodial sentence should have been seriously considered. Often you feel that someone who has committed a crime has not been punished as much as they should have been. It looks as though law and order has gone out of the window.”