Piers Morgan calls Joshua Sutcliffe's religious beliefs 'nuts'

Joshua Sutcliffe, 33, can no longer teach in any school in England following the damning verdict from a misconduct hearing into his time as a maths teacher at Cherwell School in Oxford between September 2015 and February 2018.

The former teacher, who holds strong Christian beliefs, was accused of repeatedly failing to use a transgender pupil’s preferred pronoun and expressing religious beliefs - including that he was against gay marriage - during lessons.

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He appeared on Morgan’s show Uncensored to talk about his recent teaching ban and his religious beliefs.

Whilst on the show Morgan began with sympathy towards Sutcliffe admitting the pronouns matter is “incredibly complicated”.

However, he said he would be “concerned” if he was a parent of a child in Sutcliffe’s class after reading his website that describes his religious beliefs.

Questioning Sutcliffe, Morgan said: “Well, the Bible also teaches to stone people to death but we don’t do that in civilised places any more.” 

Sutcliffe replied: “Well, that’s the penalty for sin, Piers.” 

Morgan responded: “You think it’s right to stone people to death?”

Which the former teacher responded by saying“I think that all sin deserves the death penalty. Jesus died on the cross for sinners” before confirming that he views adultery as a sin. 

“All sin is punishable by death,” he added, to which Morgan replied: “That’s nuts, mate”. 

Later on in the show, Morgan said: “This stuff is nuts mate, if you are going to say everyone who is a sinner by the rules of the Bible has to be killed there is no one left.

“There is only you left and I don’t feel comfortable about a world with only Joshua Sutcliffe alive.”

Sutcliffe was barred for life from working in English schools after a ruling by the Teaching Regulation Agency (TRA) found him guilty of unacceptable conduct.

The hearing also considered allegations from his time as a teacher St Aloysius College in Islington, London, when he was dismissed from the role after showing pupils a video which labelled figures in Islam and Mormon religions as ‘false prophets’.

Mr Sutcliffe, who was present at the hearing, denied all allegations.

The panel found he ‘fell significantly short of the standard of behaviour expected of a teacher’ and recommended the prohibition order was put in place.

Mr Sutcliffe said at the hearing that that biological sex is immutable and cannot be changed, and that the pupil he misgendered did not have the protected characteristic of gender reassignment.

The pupil in question, who identifies as he/him and is referred to as Pupil A, gave oral evidence at the hearing about his former teacher's behaviour.

This included Mr Sutcliffe congratulating a group of students – which included Pupil A – by saying ‘well done girls’, which the former teacher admitted had been a ‘slip of the tongue’.

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He was accused of other phrases which misgendered Pupil A such as ‘look at what she did’ and ‘I borrowed her calculator’.

Another pupil at Cherwell who gave evidence said the class had been shocked by the comments.

The panel also looked at a television interview on the ITV show This Morning in 2017 when Mr Sutcliffe, who was discussing his suspension from Cherwell with then hosts Phillip Schofield and Holly Willoughby, misgendered Pupil A on several occasions again.

The comments made by Mr Sutcliffe in the classroom and on television were considered by the panel as a failure to treat Pupil A with dignity and respect and a failure to safeguard his well-being.

An email sent by Mr Sutcliffe to the school, which again misgendered the pupil, was not considered a failure as it was unlikely it would have been seen by Pupil A.

The panel also considered allegations that Mr Sutcliffe had told his maths class that he was against gay marriage and expressed other views on homosexuality in class.