Scottish Union for Education – Newsletter No43 – Part 1
Newsletter Theme: responding to government guidance on LGBT-inclusive teaching in schools.
Today (Thursday 23 November) is the last day on which you can respond to the government consultation on the delivery of relationships, sexual health and parenthood (RSHP) teaching. Many SUE members have responded to the government proposals, but we would urge you to take a couple of hours out of today and respond too. As a starting point, the Christian Institute has produced a very useful article describing their concerns about the proposed guidance.
The ‘resources’ that the guidance fails to address
Daniela Martines, Education Officer, The Christian Institute
In August, the Scottish government launched its consultation on revised statutory guidance for the delivery of relationships, sexual health and parenthood (RSHP) education in Scottish schools. This has been long anticipated, with rumours of new guidance circulating since 2018.
Until the new guidance is published in its final form, schools are obliged to follow the current document, issued in 2014. Since it was published, RSHP in Scottish classrooms has steamed ahead, becoming progressively more radical and sexualising, with classroom practice seeming to outstrip anything warranted by the guidance. Indeed, what is happening in some classrooms bears little resemblance to the relatively sensible approach to this subject advocated in the 2014 guidance.
Largely, this is thanks to the Scottish government’s endorsement of a suite of materials at www.RSHP.scot which introduce pupils to a whole gamut of sexual practices, promote harmful gender ideology, and embed identity politics across the curriculum. Many parents are rightly shocked that such materials could ever be considered appropriate for use in schools. But for the purposes of this consultation, it is worth drawing a line under these resources, unsavoury as they are.
Why? Simply put, they are not required in RSHP in any school and, therefore, they do not form part of the government consultation on statutory guidance. Schools may come under pressure to make use of the RSHP.scot resource. But the government’s own 2014 guidance states, ‘No single resource is likely to fully meet the needs of all pupils’. Schools are free to use whatever resources they wish, provided they comply with the statutory guidance, council policy, and their legal obligations to parents.
Another area that does not form part of the consultation are the expectations of the Curriculum for Excellence. The vast majority of schools follow the Curriculum for Excellence, and RSHP falls within the area of health and wellbeing. Schools develop a scheme of work based around broad descriptors known as ‘experiences and outcomes’ that outline the kind of learning experiences pupils will have as part of this area of education. Following the Curriculum for Excellence is not, in fact, a legal requirement, and in any case, schools have flexibility concerning how they cover the experiences and outcomes so that teaching is relevant to individual and local needs.
Between the choice of resources, the Curriculum for Excellence, and the statutory guidance, the guidance is the one that carries clout – it is the only one of the three that carries legal obligations for schools. Local authorities and state-funded schools are required to have regard to it and may only depart from it where they can demonstrate good reasons for doing so. The draft guidance contains an overview of the relevant legal framework for RSHP and states the general principles which should underpin its delivery, including parents’ rights and the manner in which the education should be provided. It is, therefore, helpful for parents with concerns about RSHP to be familiar with the contents of the guidance. It is something they can use to hold schools to account.
But it’s also important that parents get involved now, when the content of the new guidance is still up for discussion. There are helpful principles which have been included, which perhaps demonstrates that some of the concerns being raised about RSHP have been listened to. So now is not the time to hold our tongues.
The introduction to the draft guidance acknowledges that parents ‘have the right to have their children educated in conformity with their own religious and philosophical convictions’ (Article 2, Protocol No. 1 of the European Convention on Human Rights [‘A2P1’]) and states that RSHP ‘should be presented in an objective, balanced and sensitive manner within a framework of sound values’. Although it depends somewhat on the definition of ‘sound values’, this should be good news for parents who disagree with the progressive bias present in much RSHP teaching. Upholding A2P1 requires state-funded schools to give a presentation of different viewpoints on issues of controversy, not simply promote one view as if it is the only view that exists.
Such requirements in the guidance are not just there for show. Fulfilling A2P1 is a legal duty for state-funded schools under the Human Rights Act 1998. Guidance that fails to instruct schools accurately as to their legal duties can leave the government open to legal challenge.
Likewise, views that have been expressed by religious parents and religious groups have been reflected in the draft guidance. There is a commitment to enabling ‘multiple views and values to be discussed’ in order not to exclude learners who hold different views. Such guidance on the delivery of teaching should be welcomed by all parents who are concerned that RSHP has come to be dominated by one progressive set of values and ideas to the exclusion of others. This expectation is clearly connected with the need to provide objective and balanced teaching to ensure parents’ religious and philosophical convictions are respected. Such religious and philosophical convictions include those that pertain to different faiths, but also secular views, including gender critical ones. The Employment Appeal Tribunal in Maya Forstater’s legal battle ruled that the belief that there are only two sexes and that a person cannot change sex is worthy of respect in a democratic society. Secular philosophical convictions are beliefs of conscience as much as religious beliefs, and people who hold them are protected from discrimination by the Equality Act.
Parents and others who are concerned about the direction of travel in RSHP teaching have the opportunity to drive home the advantage by responding to this public consultation and pressing for these statements to be retained in the final version of the statutory guidance. This is especially important where we feel like an unheard minority. One of the best ways to ensure that different opinions are reflected in RSHP teaching is to ensure that they are expressed at the consultation stage so civil servants and government officials can’t easily ignore them. There may well be other groups responding to the consultation, pressing for helpful wording to be watered down or removed.
You can find the guide the Christian Institute produced to help our Scottish supporters respond to the consultation here. For Scottish Union for Education readers, I’m going to highlight two key areas that are worth commenting on.
The area of parents’ rights is crucial. While there are helpful legal principles embedded in the draft guidance, there are also ways these rights could be made more secure. Parents are the guarantors of their children’s rights; parents’ rights exist to enable them to ensure their children’s rights are respected and their children are protected from the meddling of an overreaching state. It is reassuring, therefore, that the guidance does acknowledge and uphold parents’ rights.
But significant improvements could strengthen these rights. Consultation with parents is suggested as ‘good practice’, and a ‘collaborative partnership’ between schools and parents ‘should be a key element’. Such statements are good, but they will do little to ensure schools take parents’ views seriously and actually reflect them in RSHP teaching. Experience advising parents in England, where consultation is required by law, has shown that some schools are reluctant to comply with even the clearest of legal requirements to consult with parents. Without guarantees that schools will actively seek out parents’ views and take them into account, it is hard to see how they will deliver education ‘in conformity with their own religious and philosophical convictions’.
The parental right of withdrawal is a further fundamental safeguard to ensure this. It is both a mechanism by which parents can refuse to allow their children to receive educational content that undermines their conscientious beliefs and a protection that can help hold schools to account. The right to withdraw can cause logistical difficulties which schools are keen to avoid, restraining them from teaching in a way that would cause lots of parents to want to use it. But the draft guidance seems to express a false premise, claiming that a parent’s right to withdraw his or her child from RSHP might somehow conflict with the child’s right to education. Such a misunderstanding fails to recognise why parents’ rights exist in the first place and gives the impression that they are an obstacle to be overcome, rather than a tool for good. The parental right of withdrawal should be absolute. It is also crucial that this right applies to all areas of RSHP teaching where parents hold a range of views, so that it can serve its purpose of protecting parents’ rights to raise their children in accordance with their beliefs.
The consultation also asks whether the draft guidance is ‘sufficiently clear in ensuring’ that RSHP ‘is LGBT inclusive’, and there are dubious statements in the draft guidance about using ‘gender inclusive language’ so that pupils can ‘express their own identity’. It explains that the ‘relationships aspect’ is the ‘responsibility for all’ teachers, and that schools should embed this as a ‘whole school approach’. Inevitably, this opens the door to controversial views on sexual ethics and gender, or ‘diverse sexual and gender identities’, as the draft guidance puts it, being taught across the curriculum. LGBT inclusive education is not a statutory requirement, and the recommendations of the ‘LGBTI Inclusive Education Working Group’ referenced in the draft guidance are not binding on schools. Rather, they have been proposed by activists from a number of lobby organisations. Respondents should make clear that controversial LGBT ideology must not be imposed on schools by stealth through statutory guidance for RSHP. The Government must draw the distinction between the statutory requirements of RSHP and the questionable demands of LGBT lobby groups. The consultation and draft guidance are accessible here, and responses can be submitted until 23 November – today.
The Christian Institute is a non-denominational registered charity for the promotion of the Christian faith. It was founded in 1991 by Christian church leaders and professionals and is one of the largest organisations representing evangelicals, with more than 60,000 supporters throughout the UK and Ireland, including more than 5000 churches. Through meetings, print media and online resources, it helps Christians think through the implications of their faith, with a particular focus on issues such as the family, drugs, education, free speech, religious liberty, abortion and euthanasia. Since 2006, the Institute has supported legal cases of significance for religious liberty, including a UK Supreme Court win against the Scottish government, working alongside others, some of whom are now involved in SUE.
News round-up
A selection of recent stories related to Scottish education in the press in the past week, by Simon Knight.
https://unherd.com/2023/11/stop-blaming-parents-for-everything/ Ashley Frawley, Stop blaming parents for everything. Nobody seems to care when the experts get it wrong. 14/11/23
https://www.scottishlegal.com/articles/police-scotland-readies-itself-for-activation-of-hate-crime-law SLN editorial, Police Scotland readies itself for activation of hate crime law. Police Scotland is gearing up to launch a specialist unit focused on hate crimes, ahead of new legislation set to take effect next year. 21/09/23
https://www.spiked-online.com/2023/11/14/the-tories-have-abandoned-education-to-the-woke/?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email Joanna Williams, The Tories have abandoned education to the woke. 14/11/23
https://www.transgendertrend.com/no-outsiders-scheme-teaching-children-trans/ Transgender Trend editorial, No Outsiders scheme: still teaching children how to be ‘trans’. 15/11/23
https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/23926041.pisa-scotland-scottish-education-performance-deemed-disappointing/ Garratt Stell, Pisa Scotland: Scottish education performance deemed ‘disappointing’. 16/11/23
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12752995/video-exposes-trans-indoctrination-primary-school-teacher-inclusion-lessons.html Chris Matthews, Video exposes trans ‘indoctrination’ in primary school: Teacher tells 10-year-olds about how an unhappy boy teddy became a happy girl teddy in a lesson from controversial ‘inclusion’ charity. 19/11/23
https://archive.is/p0gFe Ewan Somerville, King’s College London tells academics that backing Stonewall could boost careers. The University’s application form for promotion lists controversial charity among inclusion groups staff should work with. 20/11/23
https://www.theepochtimes.com/world/campaign-group-urges-statistics-watchdog-to-investigate-not-fit-for-purpose-gender-identity-data-5532735 Owen Evans, Campaign Group Urges Statistics Watchdog to Investigate 'Not Fit for Purpose' Gender-Identity Data. There are major concerns that census data may have drastically overestimated the number of trans people in England and Wales. 20/11/23
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