George Windsor was probably Waterloo Road's most cynical teacher, perhaps even as cynical as Grantly Budgen. Despite his early unpleasantness, he later reveals himself to be a reasonably decent individual (especially in Series 10), albeit a world-weary one with a bitingly sarcastic sense of humour.
He appears in Series 8 Episode 27 and reappears from Episode 29 onwards, he has spent time in China and moved back to the UK with his wife Princess Windsor.
Series 8
George is a modern languages teacher and a former acquaintance of Christine Mulgrew, who joins Waterloo Road in Series 8 Episode 27 as a supply teacher when many staff are on strike in protest at Lorraine Donnegan's plans to turn the school into a fee-paying 'Institute of Excellence'. Nikki Boston, acting head when he first arrives, quickly comes to dislike him because of his patronising and cynical attitude. He also upsets Lula Tsibi when he mocks her campaign against Nox Pharmaceuticals.
After Christine becomes acting headteacher two episodes later, George is brought in as a permanent teacher.
Series 9
George attempts to teach Mandarin Chinese, but struggles without the aid of his wife who is from China. George treats her horribly and in revenge, she lets Barry, Kevin and Connor strip their house of items to sell as part of Simon Lowsley's Apprentice scheme. Eventually Princess walks out on him, leaving him devastated. He almost loses his job after knocking Kevin over into some chairs, but Kevin later says he just fell.
George gradually becomes more and more loyal to Christine and is asked by her to be deputy head alongside Simon Lowsley. George's career is put to the test when Christine discovers his Mandarin is not good enough to teach it, and she sends him on evening courses to improve it, and he later ends up paying native speaker pupil Archie Wong to teach him.
In the second half of Series 9, George begins a relationship with Carol Barry after punching her handsy boss at a pub she briefly works at. She later becomes a dinner lady at the school, and their relationship continues.
In Series 9 Episode 14, George's incredibly stuck-up upper class mother Marjorie turns up at the school for a surprise visit. She soon finds out about George and Carol and disapproves, and when she makes comments about Carol being lower class, George loses it and snaps at his mother, declaring himself to be "arrogant and acid-tongued" because of her influence on him, and smashes her inhaler, not believing that she is really asthmatic. He is devastated when she dies of an asthma attack in the taxi she leaves the school in.
In Series 9 Episode 17, Christine takes some time off and leaves George as acting headteacher, which goes disastrously. He has an extremely lazy attitude to acting headship, lazing about listening to cricket commentary on the radio instead of doing work, and abandoning the school entirely for a few hours, claiming he was attending a meeting. After the day ends with a rooftop protest against Lula's deportation, which George deals with terribly, Christine returns and demotes him from the deputy headship, saying she'd be better off with just one deputy from now on.
Towards the end of the series, it turns out that George's mother was in large amounts of debt when she died, which George has now inherited. He was going to cancel the cruise that he was going to take Carol on, but in the end they go on the cruise.
Series 10
In Series 10 Episode 1, Carol and George return having had a hellish experience on the cruise, and George promptly dumps Carol. Photos are soon distributed of George in the toilet on the cruise, earning him the nickname 'Skidsy Windsor'.
George and new headteacher Vaughan Fitzgerald utterly fail to get on with each other at all, and in Series 10 Episode 2, Vaughan attempts to encourage George to apply to become deputy head of Havelock High, but George refuses. Later in the episode, George has an altercation with Vaughan's son Justin, which ends in Justin hurling a box at George, narrowly missing his head. George marches Justin straight to Vaughan's office, but Vaughan sides with Justin, and George ends up resigning in disgust. Before he leaves, he lies to Carol that the compensation payout for the disastrous cruise was £2000 and gives her £1000, despite the real payout being over £15,000.
George returns in Series 10 Episode 10 and reveals to Christine that he is completely broke, having spent every penny of the £15,000. At the end of the episode, he asks Vaughan for his job back. After an initial flat no from Vaughan, George successfully bargains with him by revealing that he has important information that he will disclose to Vaughan in exchange for a job. Vaughan agrees, and George tells him that the council want to close Waterloo Road and merge it with Havelock High.
In the latter part of the second half of Series 10, unknown to Vaughan and other staff, George is revealed to have secretly been working with the council in a bid to get a head of department job through the merger, although in Series 10 Episode 20 he changes his mind and manages to stop the merger by threatening to blackmail his council girlfriend. He does not tell Vaughan or Christine clearly how the merger was stopped but hints that a particular student (Bonnie Kincaid) made him change his mind. George is last seen clinking a glass with Christine at the celebration of the cancellation of the merger.
Quotes
- [singing] "The Internationale unites the human race. Arise ye workers from your slumbers, ari-" (first line)
- Christine: "George Windsor."
- George: "Christine Mulgrew!"
- Christine: "I'm surprised you're not dead."
- George: "I'm surprised you're not drunk."
- Christine: "What happened to China, did they kick you out for being too right-wing?"
- George: "Uh, look, let me tell you how this is gonna work, um, I'm basically here to keep the school open and the kids occupied, I don't do marking, I don't do discipline, so the first hint of any trouble from any child and I'll send them straight to you."
- Nikki: "Anything else?!"
- George: "Uh, yes, when the bell goes, I go."
- Lula: "I will never touch their drugs."
- George: "Well then you're as dumb as the fat rabbits they keep at Nox."
- Nikki: "Oh! You again."
- Audrey: "Apparently Mr Windsor has become a permanent member of our team now!"
- George: "Breathe slowly, and the excitement will abate."
- "And are senior management being silly too, or is that just us plebs?"
- "What is that weird squeak I hear, is it a mouse? A door with a faulty hinge? A distress call from a dying world? Oh no, it's Rhiannon, a girl who's had more warnings than Hurricane Katrina."
- Sue: "Is it always like this?"
- George: "Like what?"
- "Ah, Audrey. I just heard the UN are looking for more peacekeepers, if you're at a loose end...?"
- "Little birdie been whispering in your ear, has he? Curly barnet? Overuse of male grooming products?"
- Christine: "How do you fancy a joint deputy position? Subject to the usual interview process, of course."
- George: "Joint? With Mr Lousy? Hardly a match made in heaven, is it?"
- Christine: "My thoughts exactly."
- "Now I'm deputy head, do you think it's appropriate that I play the role of your subordinate?"
- "You know, you're absolutely right. I don't have any respect for you. Why would I have anything other than complete contempt for someone so stupid that they let three hormone-ravaged neanderthals run amok in our home?!"
- "I couldn't keep her, Christine. The one good thing that's ever happened to me in my life, and I couldn't keep her. So...looks like I'm Mr Drear and Lonely once again."
- "Look, I don't know what game you're playing but...really not in the mood right now. My head feels like the inside of the Large Hadron Collider."
- George: "Moving forward, let's hope we'll all be on the same page. Indeed, singing from the same hymn sheet."
- Christine: "That's the first time I've seen you smile since Princess left."
- George: "Was that a smile? Suppose it was."
- Christine: "How are the night school studies?"
- George: "Oh, positively bacchanalian."
- George: "Let's hope he gets shot down by the Luftwaffe."
- Christine: "I wish you'd stop winding him up!"
- George: "Sorry. But if you want this thing to run smoothly, you really wanna pull Audrey back from the front line. The old girl's lost it with this living history thing, I doubt we'll ever get her back to the present! And I think you've also gone out on a limb, inviting the beady eye of the council round to our little empire."
- Simon: "Anything that'll help."
- George: "Help what, claw your way to the top?"
- George: "Only saying what we're both thinking. Pretty shabby way to behave, assembling a secret dossier."
- Simon: "Then tell me, are you upset for Christine's sake? Or because the main cause of complaint was your fraudulent Mandarin teaching?"
- "God, he really is a poisonous little sh..."
- "Come on then, I'll let you buy me a drink. You can tell me all about the joys of spending the afternoon with Mr Lousy. I assume the egregious little toad was nauseatingly pompous about the whole mix-up?"
- "So how did Lord Lowsley take the news? Nose out of joint, I imagine?"
- "Can we expect a terror alert every morning? Perhaps a fire bomb tomorrow, or an acid attack?" (Series 9 Episode 11, replayed as one of the quotes from past and present characters heard at the end of Series 10 Episode 20)
- "Lock up your daughters, George Windsor's back on the market."
- "Weekend in a remote Scottish loch with a lot of hormonal teenagers, anyone?"
- "I'm sorry, I can't let you get away with that." (before punching Carol's boss Toby)
- "Last time I gave the photocopying code to a student, it resulted in 200 copies being made of my face attached to the body of a gazelle."
- George: "This a good idea? I do teach your daughter."
- Carol: "Well, maybe you could teach me a few things."
- "I'm afraid my mother is coming up tomorrow. The old dragon would eat you alive."
- "Don't pretend to be deaf as well as asthmatic, you're a vile and spiteful woman, who's notions of superiority seem to be based on your privileged birth! You know what's worse? I'm exactly like you! So if you wonder what kind of man I've become, Mother, well, this is it. Arrogant and acid-tongued, the man you made me. So I hope you're proud of your handiwork, because I for one am not!"
- "Yes, you're not seeing things, Sonya. If I'm going to be king for the day, it's important I make an effort."
- "Oh, you know, the old Windsor one-two, full-on charm offensive! Ah? Well, it doesn't seem to've uh, burned down in your absence, Mrs Mulgrew! Tell you what, though, Christine, tell you what, you wanna watch out, there's a new head ar-"
- George: "No need to get heated, Simon. I was off-campus, and you simply couldn't deal with the situation."
- Simon: "No, no, you were there when the pupils were on the roof, and what did you do? Nothing!"
- Christine: "Simon will be taking over your SMT duties from now on."
- George: "Right. What? Si-?"
- Christine: "Yeah, I think I am better off with just one deputy for now."
- "Look, Christine, I hope you take this in the spirit in which it's intended, but um...you need to go home."
- "I don't judge, because I'm not exactly without flaws, and I don't gossip, because I have no friends, so...the perfect confidante."
- "Roll on 3:30. The sooner we're on that cruise ship and away from Lowsley, the better."
- George: "To what? You'd bled me dry by the time we reached Bilbao! There's nothing left, it's finished!"
- Carol: "What you talking about, finished?"
- George: "Not just talking about the cash. Talking about us."
- "I'm not big on communal breast-beating sessions, so uh...no. I wouldn't."
- "Yes, great. Carol and I have split up. Being trapped on a plague ship with a bunch of geriatric Americans was testing, to say the least. We never really recovered."
- Christine: "Well, you've got a new term and a progressive new head to take your mind off it all, now."
- George: "If by progressive you mean having an affair with a colleague whilst your wife and sons are in the same school, then yes, you're right, I have."
- George: "So, a gold-digger and a liar? Hardly surprising given you're a denizen of the criminal underworld."
- Carol: "Excuse me?"
- George: "I was gonna share some of this compensation payout with you, but you've just kissed goodbye to every last penny of that, along with whatever remains of our friendship."
- Vaughan: "Havelock High is looking for a new deputy head. I've been asked to put forward names of potential candidates, I thought of you."
- George: "Gosh. I wonder what I've done to merit recommendation from the visionary that is Vaughan Fitzgerald?"
- "Good grief. Reduced to answering calls from nerds in need. Is there no god?"
- George: "What, like a police statement? What is this, some kind of court of law? I am a teacher, he is a pupil! I will not be writing down my version of events, especially as the outcome is so obviously a formality! What I will do, however...is to write my letter of resignation!"
- Vaughan: "Your choice."
- George: "Yes it is. Quite frankly, I'd prefer to drink battery acid than be part of your happy-clappy hug-a-hoodie new dawn! That child should be out on his ear after violence of that nature."
- Vaughan: "Alleged violence."
- George: "You run this school however the hell you want, but without me. I'm sure you'll all live happily ever after."
- Christine: "What on earth are you doing here?"
- George: "Hello George, how fabulous to see you, and looking so well!"
- "So still standing then? Vaughan Trapp hasn't run it into the ground just yet?"
- George: "I met with the head of Havelock today, who assures me that he is increasing the size of every department in the school to accommodate the influx of new students, following the proposed merger with..."
- Vaughan: "Waterloo Road?!"
- "Any other surprises we need to be aware of? Only, you know, tannoy systems, chimney sweeps. Not sure Audrey's heart could cope with much more."
- George: "Fitzgerald, teaching? Voluntarily? The man's clearly deranged."
- Audrey: "Nothing wrong with teaching. I'm proud of my career."
- George: "I rest my case. I mean, first the loudhailer, then reconnecting with the nation's youth, he's gonna be invading Poland next."
- "Yes, off you go. Feel free to kill each other. Provided it's not on my watch."
- "First person to locate that contraption and throw it in a skip wins a prize." (about the school's tannoy)
- Marco: "Marco D'Olivera."
- George: "So, which one are you? Brainless and untrained, or just brainless?"
- "Well I'm glad someone's managing to make light of it. Now if you'll excuse me, I have several decades of teaching experience to put into practice."
- "Is this really what teaching has come to, Audrey? You and me desperately trying to defend our cheese and taramasalata while Olga and that other whippersnapper are going on some jolly."
- "I was gonna mention the constant loud music, the fact that you seem to be moulting, and the way in which my cups seem to be forming little flashmobs in your bedroom, but I thought it would hold things up."
- Leo: "I've not done it, Sir."
- George: "'I've not done it'. That's it, is it? No 'aliens stole my textbook' or 'my mother put it in the spin drier' or 'it's been optioned for a Hollywood blockbuster', just 'I haven't done it'."
- Vaughan: "We will also have the PTA here for a meeting."
- George: "We will also be hosting a wedding, two bar mitzvahs and a Scots Guard regimental dinner."
- Christine: "George, what's happened to you lately? You're in serious danger of turning into a very nice man."
- George: "Rubbish."
- "I did warm to Bonnie. When everyone else seemed to think she was the devil incarnate - I can't imagine why that struck a chord. But, it was a momentary lapse, and it won't happen again."
- Sonya: "Here, you um...you don't think Guy's gay, do ya?"
- George: "Um, well, having heard some of his record collection when he was staying with me, I would say that's probably a racing certainty."
- Rob: "See, you need to play to your strengths."
- George: "And we don't have any."
- Rob: "On the contrary, you have one very powerful one."
- George: "And what would that be, your wife?"
- Selina: "But I hope you're not going out with me just because of the job I've wangled for you."
- George: "Well, I hope you're not going out with me just because it's useful to have a mole in the enemy camp."
- "Police, ambulances, paramedics, you know, average day at Waterloo Road. I wouldn't worry about it, it'll be history soon."
- "Although, I'm not so sure. Especially given that I've been recording this entire conversation. Yes, I'm afraid the kids got to me too."
- "Dead in the water? Yup. Which saddens me more than I'd expected. That's the problem with finding out you have a heart. Things hurt." (final line)