Lobby Day On Sex And Relationship Education In Primary Schools

On Thursday 1 December I presented a petition of over 45,000 signatures to the Department for Education of parents who are against explicit sex education in primary schools. This followed a Lobby Day I sponsored in Parliament on Thursday 24 November to discuss this issue.

The meeting was addressed by a range of speakers, including Antonia Tully, leader of a campaign 'Safe at School' which advises parents and teachers who are concerned about the explicit nature of sex education in schools. There were also a number of parents from Northamptonshire and other parts of England who addressed the meeting and spoke of their experiences with their own children and finding out about the material that was being shown to them at school.

I have been contacted by a number of local parents expressing their concerns. It is, of course, a very difficult issue for many parents to raise, and there is always the delicate balance between expressing concern for what your children are seeing and not being seen to rock the boat or wishing to alienate them among their school friends.

A number of MPs and Lords attended the meeting and I think the whole room was shocked by seeing some of the material that is being used to teach young children about sex. The Department for Education is currently drafting new guidelines for schools on sex and relationship education (SRE) and I would like to see a form of independent classification of the material used. The British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) has been rating films for 99 years and seems to be well placed to assess material, and I am sure that this would give worried parents some peace of mind in knowing what their children were seeing.

To see some of the images being shown to very young children in our primary schools was genuinely shocking. We are not asking the Government to start implementing legislation on SRE material but we are saying we think the status quo is quite wrong and we want to work with the Department and parents to make sure there is good guidance over what materials are used in schools.

I met with Nick Gibb MP, the Schools Minister yesterday with some of the parents from Northamptonshire to discuss the meeting and the issues which were raised. I know the Minister takes this matter very seriously and I hope he will take on board my idea of allowing the BBFC to age rate material.

(Picture shows Andrea presenting the petition to the Department for Education)

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