100 organisations ask Labour to abandon Tory revised guidelines on RSHE

[IwantToRetire]

The Conservative government launched a consultation in May on planned updates to guidance first issued in 2019, following a review of the reforms.

It proposed age limits on “sensitive” topics, ordered schools not to teach about “gender identity” and to share materials with parents.

Ministers were accused at the time of stirring up “culture war” issues in the run-up to the election.

The consultation closes today.

To coincide with its closure, more than 100 organisations including the ASCL and NAHT leaders’ unions, the PSHE Association, Sex Education Forum, Barnardo’s, Refuge and Everyone’s Invited have issued a joint statement calling for a “fresh start” to the review.

“We are calling on the next government to discard the draft guidance and begin this process in due course, focusing on the needs of children and young people and supporting teachers to deliver a high-quality, inclusive curriculum.”

Lucy Emmerson, CEO of the Sex Education Forum, said age restrictions would be a “backward step making children more vulnerable to abuse and harm”.

PSHE association chief executive Jonathan Baggaley, warned he had “deep concerns about the development process and shortcomings of the draft guidance, particularly on critical aspects of children’s safeguarding, wellbeing and inclusion”.

And Lynn Perry, chief executive of Barnardo’s, said introducing age limits to RSHE topics “risks children missing out on crucial teaching about abuse and exploitation”.

Continues at https://schoolsweek.co.uk/labour-faces-pressure-to-ditch-tory-rshe-reforms/

Organisations whose core purpose is part of the established safeguarding framework (NSPCC, IWF) opposing measures to safeguard children is not "hilarious". They are indulging in P/politics at the expense of keeping children safe. That is not funny.

While I'm at it, you don't respond to a poster saying she's found something triggering or upsetting by encouraging her to read more of the kind of thing that's upset her. Cassie you really know nothing about safeguarding, the law, or trauma-informed work. You've proved it over and over. You don't need to keep showing us how little you know. We get it. We believe your knowledge and insight here, is zero.

The right approach with this very challenging situation is to ensure that people can speak openly and tease out the issues.
That women / parents can discuss issues without being told "Massive amount of pearl clutching going on, under the pretext of "the children".
That the nuanced issues around the ages that children can cope with different information can be discussed without organisations with no direct experience of teaching SRE in mainstream schools weighing in and insisting that they know better.
That the principle of working in partnership with parents that's embedded into our legislation since the 1989 Children Act is restored.
That the bad faith actors who spend their time promoting the view that parents are right wing, transphobic, homophobic bigots that children need protection from are educated about the dreadful outcomes for children alienated from their families.

None of the above will remove the presence or influence of the porn industry / fetish promoting organisations. But it will restore the balance in terms of influence, where the views of those who love, care for and know their children are elevated above the bullying ignorance of the online mob.

@ResisterOfTwaddleRex "Anyway, I think this letter is like that. Some of these organisations' opposition can only really be explained by an irrational opposition to anything the Tories did."
I must admit, something like that did occur to me as I was reading the EVAW site.
Almost like, as conservative organisations and individuals come to see the truth of the points about domestic violence and child sexual abuse that only feminists were making in the 70s and 80s, people who strongly identify as progressive feminists feel like they need to assert something that conservatives won't be able to agree with. So, "we need to talk to nine year old children about anal sex otherwise any abuse they suffer is on your hands" doesn't feel like bonkers off the rails stuff, it resonates emotionally because they know conservatives will say, "no way."
I had an experience like that nursing a woman on a psych ward who was in an abusive relationship. "It's ok," she said to me, "I've read what I need to do to take care of myself on the Jehovah's Witness website." I felt physically sick and went to look at jw.org imagining I'd feel like a good cry and a shower afterwards. The information for women in abusive marriages was actually good. And, for believers, obviously brilliant because it was in a psycho-socio-spiritual package that was meaningful to them. I had a really strong reaction, a voice in my head started saying, Well, it's not /that/ good advice... And I had to tell myself to stop it and just accept that the Jehovah's Witnesses, despite their rigidity, are interested in seeking truth and doing good and are capable of learning, too.

Just say thanks to pp in last few posts bringing some sensitivity and better insight to this.

Thank you for this @LilyBartsHatShop:
"And I had to tell myself to stop it and just accept that the Jehovah's Witnesses, despite their rigidity, are interested in seeking truth and doing good and are capable of learning, too".

Life, experience, working with different people, being a parent, living in a community, all teach us that common values are shared by people with different beliefs, political views etc. There's a frustrating level of toddler thinking prevalent at the moment where "left = good & right = bad " Frantically trying to pigeon hole people in order to dismiss their valid opinions.

It's uninformed childish thinking and while I'm sure we've all had that feeling on occasions, allowing it to influence how we safeguard children really is unforgivable.

And @CassieMaddox FYI year 10 children are 14/15 years old so not legal age for sex. I thought you would be aware of this have teenage boys and all that.

Discussing internet safety with children can be done in a completely non-explicit way.

Children have smartphones, you can discuss turning off air-drop from unknown (Apple should have this disabled by default, if it isn't already), set social media profiles to be private etc.

Not sure why there is this desire to teach all children explicit content just because a minority may have already experienced it.

Just wanted to add that I first noticed maybe 5/6 years ago that certain organisations began referring to my child as 'my young person'. My experience was with a local autism charity and our local CAMHS centre. My child was 14 at this time. It never felt quite right but I was desperately seeking help and thought as these were the experts it must be right. They did not regard her as a child and encouraged me to treat her as a young person. This as a parent never did sit well.

That's a common feature of trans activists - they always discuss children by referring to adults. Their complete lack of understanding or care about children's wellbeing and rights is so clear.

I'm sure you deliberately misrepresent me.
I find it hilarious that you are so anti "the left" that you would interpret those charities signing a letter as because they are anti-Conservatives rather than genuinely concerned. It is rather a niche interpretation.

A cursory read of what various charities say would show they have good reasons for signing that letter. I agree with them. As there is no longer a Conservative government it seems unlikely they doing it for party political reasons.

🙄

Many posters here aren't "discussing the issues though". They are dictating the answer, on behalf of all parents, and shaming, insulting and attacking those of us that disagree.

Case in point.

Anyone who disagrees must be bad faith/a man/a trans activist.

You haven’t really explained why you disagree though. You keep saying things, then people ask why or what you mean, and then you ignore that and make a new point. I’d like to understand your point of view, but you just pivot when challenged so it’s very hard to understand what you’re trying to say.

Care to explain what the face means?

Twas ever thus.

I think disregarding the valuable time parents, teachers, school governors and others have given up to respond to the existing consultation suggests disturbing authoritarianism. It suggests that if the government doesn't like the response, they'll disregard it. Why would anyone bother next time? What guarantee would there be that someone would read your response and not just totally disregard it and start again?

Even if the guidance is substantially changed, to throw away all the time and effort respondants have put in is disrespectful and will mean that it will take much longer to reach a point that teachers have guidance. This is not acceptable, it is not in children's best interests.

The guidance is draft and the consultation is about that. It can be changed. To suppress the responses is anti-democratic and not in the interests of children, schools or teachers.

I don't think that's fair. I've explained a lot of my reasoning, only to be told I'm a man/making it up/a risk to children etc.

But assuming this is good faith, I'll explain again.

I think the root of the problem with RHSE in schools is variable quality providers. I would prefer to see delivery more centralised so quality is controlled and parents can be confident their children are being taught the same material.

The Conservatives were proposing an approach of banning teaching certain subjects at certain ages. My personal feeling is those ages are too high for the 21st century where children are being exposed to sex and sexual content through the Internet in a way we can't understand. I feel the age limits were suggested to pacify traditional Conservative voters rather than to actually safeguard children.

So for example, banning teaching about porn until year 7 is too late. We know a lot of primary children are exposed to porn (10-25%); those children are most at risk. They need teaching the language and pathways to explain what they have seen in an age appropriate way. I think if there is a blanket ban on teaching about it, the easiest way for schools to comply is to avoid the topic and that's harmful for children.

I also think the age limits of healthy relationships and sex in secondary school are too high; again we know children have sex too young and get into unhealthy relationships, we know teen pregnancies reduced when there was access to better education and contraception. The Conservatives proposed age limits appear to go against what the evidence says.

Only a very small part of these proposed changes are about gender ideology. I don't think charities have signed this letter because they are "ideologically captured". I think theyve signed it because they are worried about the consequences for children.

It means I can't be arsed to explain again in the face of pass agg snark

See I think centrally setting arbitrary rules is authoritarian. We will have to agree to disagree.
I doubt very much Labour will implement the proposed guidelines as they are much more likely to go back to a more centralised LEA type model.

Who’s right to say that having a slightly more conservative view about sex is a wrong thing?! Some level of upset would serve as a defence mechanism too. Discussing sex is completely different to introducing porn. 8-9 years old for porn education is completely nuts! We send kids to school to learn skills and way of thinking, not for them to be sexualised!

1/5 children suffer from parental alcohol issues; 15-20% neurodiversity etc etc. The list goes on!! Should children be tasked up to solve all the issues in the world, without any tools first?!

When the children don’t know what the hell is porn and never heard of porn yet, they gain no benefit from being introduced to it.

Luckily your view is the minority at least from this thread and hopefully government would be more level headed.

Okay thank you for trying to explain again @CassieMaddox. However I and several others have asked why you think exposing all children to information about a topic is an answer to the fact some children are exposed to it at a very young age.

So this bit:

‘So for example, banning teaching about porn until year 7 is too late. We know a lot of primary children are exposed to porn (10-25%); those children are most at risk. They need teaching the language and pathways to explain what they have seen in an age appropriate way. I think if there is a blanket ban on teaching about it, the easiest way for schools to comply is to avoid the topic and that's harmful for children.’

Why do you think it’s important/necessary to give information about porn to the 75 - 90% of 10 year olds (or younger) who know nothing about it?

And others have asked you what you envisage would be the way to do that in a way that is age appropriate. When you say they need ‘language and pathways ’ what do you mean? I’m genuinely struggling to understand why you think the majority of children need language to describe porn pre secondary school.

If primary school age children have been exposed to porn that seems like a failure of the adults who are meant to keep them safe from such content. Yes those children may well need support and to be able to speak about what they saw. That sounds like a job for counsellors or other specialists to me. Not something that a) should be dealt with in a whole class setting or b) that other children should then have to hear about.

It’s worth going back to this as some posters have suggested schools do something that already happens and won’t end with the guidance.

but I imagine you would teach them they might see adult stuff on the Internet that they find disgusting, scary or upsetting. This is how you report it. This is who you can talk to about it. This is what to do if you see it in school.

Internet safety happens in primary and is covered for parents and children. I’m not sure what posters want outside this.

I also think it suggests a disturbing interest in breaking the bonds between parents and their children. People who wish to do that are a danger to children and everyone needs to recognise such behaviour, and not allow it to stand.

Yes. Also to be clear, where I do agree with these 100 organisations is that the short timescale was potentially problematic, especially once a general election had been factored in. I think it would have been perfectly reasonable for them to request an extension to the deadline.

But to lobby for everyone's submissions to be discarded shows, I think, a quite startling level of arrogance - and that's about the most diplomatic way I can put it.