A girl aged 12 yesterday lost her fight to be allowed to wear a full-face veil in class when a High Court judge backed her school’s decision to ban it.

The Muslim girl’s lawyers had argued that the school’s actions were irrational and infringed her human rights, after it had allowed her older sisters to wear the niqab for nine years.

But Mr Justice Silber ruled that the Buckinghamshire school’s veil ban was “proportionate” for security reasons, that it upheld uniform policy, prevented others coming under pressure to wear it and because the veil stopped teachers from relating well to pupils.

Lawyers for the family said that were bitterly disappointed and were considering appealing against the judgment.

Of the 120 Muslim girls in the 1,300plus pupil school, about half wear a headscarf, or hijab, but none wears a niqab.

During the case, the judge was told that the three older sisters had all played an active part in the school and that staff had never objected to their niqabs. All had achieved high A-level results, which showed that the veil had not impaired their learning, her lawyers argued. One was now in medical research, the second was training to be a doctor and the third was at university.

As a result, they said, the ban on the youngest girl was irrational, thwarted her “legitimate expectation” to be allowed to wear it and breached her right to freedom of “thought, conscience and religion” under Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

The 12-year-old girl, known as claimant X for legal reasons, joined the grammar school in September 2005. She chose not to wear the veil in her first year, but last year, after reaching puberty, decided to wear it. The headmistress objected and she was removed.

Although she is receiving tuition at home and was offered a place at a different, mixed grammar school that permits the niqab, she wishes to go back to her old school.

But Mr Justice Silber, who stressed that he was dealing solely with the facts of one case and was not seeking to resolve the wider issue of wearing the niqab in schools, rejected her plea.

In a summary of the judgment, he said her human rights had not been breached because she had been offered another place at a similar school, where she could wear the niqab. Equally the school was within its rights to ban the veil for security reasons, the importance it attached to a uniform and the need not to put others under pressure into wearing it.

“I took into account the margin of discretion allowed to the school and held that the decision of the school was proportionate,” he wrote.

He said that not only had no other girl tried to wear the niqab under the current headmistress, but that a long time had passed since the girl’s sisters had left the school.

“The evidence shows that there was now a greater concern for security and that the experience of the staff at the school is that they were impeded in teaching the sisters of the claimant because they wore the niqab,” he added.

The judge urged the girl to accept the offer of a place at a nearby grammar school, rather than continuing to miss out on a large part of her education.

The girl’s headmistress said that she hoped her pupil would return, even though she was not allowed to wear the veil. “We want to focus now on supporting our student,” she said. “We hope that she will return to school and resume her education as part of our community.”

Andrew Adonis, the Schools Minister, welcomed the judgment, which came as the Government dismissed calls for schools to do more to accommodate Muslim pupils who want to wear a headscarf or grow a beard.

The Muslim Council of Britain also accused state schools of failing to respect the wishes of Muslim children when organising sex education, changing rooms and religious assemblies.

Veil wars

December 2006: Jack Straw sparked a row in his Blackburn constituency when he said he would ask women visiting his constituency surgeries to remove the niqab

November 2006: Aishah Azmi, a teaching assistant who refused to remove her veil in the classroom of a Church of England primary school, lost her job

March 2006: Shabina Begum, a young Muslim girl, failed in her legal battle to force every school in Britain to allow pupils to decide their own dress code according to religious belief

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