UK Edition
Rishi Sunak is considering launching an urgent review of “age-inappropriate” sex education materials in schools, The Telegraph understands.
The Prime Minister has told multiple colleagues that he is alarmed about the content of Relationship and Sex Education (RSE) lessons taught in classrooms across the country.
This week, he was presented with a dossier of evidence by MPs showing that “unsuitably sexually explicit” teaching resources and lessons presenting gender fluidity as fact have been prepared for children.
The evidence, collated by the New Social Covenant Unit think tank, includes case studies of primary school children as young as nine being taught about masturbation. In other instances, the think tank found school children had been “indoctrinated” with contested gender ideology theories that could make them question whether they have been born in the wrong body.
Miriam Cates, the Conservative MP for Pennistone and Stockbridge, delivered the 130-page report to the Prime Minister on Wednesday and has urged him to consider a “public inquiry”.
“It’s becoming more and more clear how inappropriate materials are,” she told The Telegraph. “This is a very widespread problem.”
She said that the teaching of trans identification in schools has become increasingly common and could be contributing to a rise in the number of children seeking medical intervention, including puberty blockers and hormone treatment.
The report argues that a moratorium on aspects of RSE teaching may be necessary to “halt a widespread culture of safeguarding failure”. It raises concerns about the influence of third-party providers on RSE in schools.
‘Unscientific ideological education’
Nick Fletcher, the Conservative MP for Don Valley, also confronted the Prime Minister this week, calling for a meeting to discuss: “how we can stop this unscientific ideological education being taught in our schools and get our children learning what they should be learning.”
An RSE programme drawn up by Swindon Borough Council advises teaching 12 and 13 year olds using the controversial “genderbread person” diagram which suggests that biological sex is a spectrum and that babies are “assigned” a gender at birth.
Mrs Cates told The Telegraph that the inquiry should not be conducted by the Department for Education (DfE), because “part of the problem” is the RSE guidance it produced in 2019.
The guidance, signed off by Damian Hinds, the then education secretary, did not set a limit on what can be taught, teachers have warned. Mrs Cates said the DfE had been overly influenced by activist lobby groups when it produced the guidance, which states that “gender identity” should be taught as part of the curriculum.
The Government press release announcing the new guidance in 2019 included a statement from the LGBTQ+ charity Stonewall hailing it as a “real, positive step forward for LGBT inclusion in England’s schools”.
‘Engage with parents’
During the leadership election campaign last summer, Mr Sunak pledged that guidance on relationship and sex education in schools would be put on a statutory footing in order to shield children from inappropriate material.
The intervention by MPs in England follows sex education lessons on the Isle of Man being suspended after a drag queen allegedly told 11-year-olds that there are 73 genders. The self-governing crown dependency has launched an independent review of its personal, social, health and economic education curriculum after parents raised the alarm about the “graphic, disproportionate, indecent presentation” of sexual acts and different gender identities understood to have been taught in lessons.
A DfE spokesman said: “We have made Relationships, Sex and Health Education (RSHE) a compulsory part of the school curriculum to help young people to make informed decisions about their wellbeing, health and relationships. Schools must make sure all content they use is factual and age-appropriate, and engage with parents so they are aware of what their children are being taught.”
Dame Rachel de Souza, the Children’s Commissioner, said: “There is no doubt that the duty to protect children from harmful or inappropriate content both online and offline is of paramount importance – but it is just as important that they are given the knowledge and skills they need to navigate the world around them and make sensible, informed judgements. That’s why we must put their views and voices at the heart of how RSHE is taught, while also making sure that parents and carers are given reassurances about what they are learning.”