Still Asleep at the Wheel: A Further Examination of Gender and Safeguarding in Schools - Policy Exchange

[IwantToRetire]

A new report by Policy Exchange reveals that secondary schools in England are still heavily influenced by gender ideology. Too many secondary schools are socially transitioning gender-distressed children without reliably informing parents, failing to adhere to their safeguarding responsibilities and compromising the rights and interests of other children in school.

The report includes FOI research assessing schools’ policies, replicating an identical round of FOI research carried out for Asleep at the Wheel: An Examination of Gender and Safeguarding in Schools in 2023.

Despite some progress, particularly regarding the provision of single-sex toilets and changing rooms, we found that many schools still lack adequate policies. In a minority of schools, it appears that contested beliefs about gender identity remain embedded: staff support children to begin a social transition in the school environment and teach contested ideas as fact. In other schools, staff are failing to uphold their safeguarding duties, as they do not reliably involve parents, the Designated Safeguarding Lead, or a medical professional. The interests of other children are often compromised, as all children are required adopt a transitioning child’s new name and pronouns.

Moreover, many schools permit a child to self-identify as a different gender and participate in sports activities with opposite sex. We found that:

• 70% and 73% of schools maintain single-sex toilets and changing rooms.
• 43% of secondary schools reliably inform parents when a child discloses feelings of gender distress.
• 58% of schools reliably involve a safeguarding lead or medical professional in these cases.

More than one third of schools do not maintain single-sex sports.
The report calls for the Government to amend the draft statutory guidance, Keeping Children Safe in Education 2026, on which it is currently consulting.

As Baroness Falkner of Margravine, former Chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, said in her Foreword to the report:

“Schools require greater clarity and authoritative guidance, consistently enforced. They carry a significant responsibility and must be supported to understand how to discharge their duties lawfully, consistently, and with confidence.”

https://policyexchange.org.uk/publication/still-asleep-at-the-wheel/

I don't think it is that different because the same sort of attitudes can mean the child is at risk purely because they've gotten pregnant.

I agree with the rest. Though I think that secondary school.age children should hsve private changing facilities full stop. I was amazed to see that the guidelines say children up to 11 can be in a mixed changing environment. Thankfully, that wasnt the case for us at all past the juniors and when we went swimming, it was in a public pool and we could all have our own room within the single sex changing rooms.

Same for all of my kids.

I think staying quiet and not telling the parents might be a better decision in some cases.

In which case, who then has the parental responsibility for what's happening? The legal responsibility.

Or do you just think parents should be cut out of the picture all together? And the child simply left dangling with no legal, parental responsibility in their lives?

This is a great way of laying it out. My opinion as follows:

Yes, 8 is way too late. By this point, it's highly likely that the child has locked onto an inevitable pathway towards medical transition.

If staff overheard 1, a note should be made on the safeguarding system (e.g. CPOMS) that the child is at risk of becoming gender questioning. If that happens again, another note should be made. If there is a pattern of it continuing to happen, as evidenced by these CPOMS entries (e.g. 3 occasions), parents should be informed. Ideally, the KCSIE guidance would tell schools to point parents to the Cass Report. Critically, schools should not position gender identity as fact when discussing this with parents. Instead they should say that some people believe we all have a gender identity. They could tell parents that the Cass Report supports the position that gender identity is real but that it also highlights risks associated with it.

If staff overheard 2, parents should immediately be informed and directed towards the Cass Report as above (and obviously a CPOMS note made).

Thankfully, my daughter spoke to her dad and me somewhere between 1 and 2. She got as far as thinking she might be trans and wanted puberty blockers to buy time to figure everything out. We listened and thought that request sounded reasonable based on what she told us. I then did lots of research, found the interim Cass Report and we eventually navigated a support pathway for her. It wasn't easy. Had she not spoken to us herself, and had the school told us after point 2, I firmly believe that this support journey would have been a lot harder because it would have been even more difficult (than it was) to stop multiple professionals pulling her towards social transition.

Staying quiet is a safeguarding failure.

Either you think the parents are safe, in which case you must tell them, or you think the parents are a danger to the child, in which case you must tell social services.

There is no case in which a school is qualified to make any decisions on behalf of a child, especially with regard to something with potential physical and psychological consequences as serious as declaring a trans identity. Even Cass, with her many caveats, made this clear.

I dont have children so on one level cant really comment, but would have though 5/6.

Because this is a step beyond what might just be a groups of friends sharing experiences, ideas, whatever.

But 5/6 is telling an adult. And whilst this thread is about parents, there is also the issue of the teacher.

Whatever the future outcome might be, should a teacher be put in the position of being the only adult who knows, and by not saying anything is effectively affirming.

From that aspect is that right for the teacher, or even if the teacher shares with other staff.

That they know and the parents dont.

Not sure I would want to be that teacher.

If the school has good reason to believe that a child's parents are or might be homophobic and the child says something that leads staff to believe they are potentially gay/bi, then yes, this child may be at risk at home. This should be managed as a safeguarding issue, where the parents may be a risk to the child. Regardless, there is no immediate reason why a school would need to tell parents that a child is exploring their sexual orientation because it's not risky to do so. Being gay or bi isn't harmful.

But a child being gender questioning is a different matter entirely. Unfortunately, if the parents are homophobic, the parents may want to "trans away the gay", by helping them to identify as the opposite sex and "become straight". However, they should still be informed that their child is gender questioning and the school should make it very clear that being gender questioning is completely different from being gay. Not to pander to the homophobia but to highlight the risk that their child is vulnerable to becoming locked in to an identity that could lead to permanent harm (e.g. believing that in future they will need to take irreversible medication or remove body parts). If the parents can't understand this difference, they will need help to do so. A referral to Children's Services may well be appropriate, depending on the reaction and attitude of the parents.

Please can you explain how you would do this, especially where you don't believe it's safe to tell the parents that their child is gender questioning.

Edited to add that my question relates to you saying that the following is pretty much your line of thinking: Just don't let children socially transition at school. Then there is no concern about whether to tell the parents or not.

I don't think its always as simple as that

So a child makes a request to socially transition, the school says no.... and then that's the end of it?

Any child who believes they need to socially transition is at risk of harm e.g. that child may believe they need to source puberty blockers to stop their body changing. Why would the school just say no and ignore all of the many risks related to social transition?

People don't consider a child's friendship group as all calling that child by a different name and pronouns as 'socially transitioning' then? It only counts if the teachers are doing it?

Yes it is.

"Whatever the future outcome might be, should a teacher be put in the position of being the only adult who knows, and by not saying anything is effectively affirming".

Safeguarding guidance determines that teachers should never promise confidentiality to children. Way back the trans lobby group GIRES offered free and very dangerous "training" to adults working with children where they told individual adults to keep secret a child's disclosure that they were really the opposite sex. They were completely ignorant of safeguarding, legislation & how confidentiality operates in safeguarding.

That's when I realised how dangerous to children this ideology was and how transactivists were self identifying as "experts" while being precisely the opposite. It took years before they amended their "training" to include a safeguarding perspective and then they hid it from public view so heaven knows what's in it now.

That's how safeguarding children has been systematically undermined. Nobody at the DfE exercised any due diligence about these organisations nd now the whole toxic and dangerous to children ideology is having to be prised out of schools and away from children. And as Policy Exchange demonstrates, it's still well embedded.

The teachers on this thread have patiently explained how safeguarding children works in schools and tried to reflect how complexities are managed. Yet posters still decide that their views must matter more than all the safeguarding guidance - which as @WarriorN pointed out, is informed by the countless tragedies & subsequent Case Reviews where institutions have failed to safeguard children.

I'm personally delighted that the gender questioning guidance has been located in statutory safeguarding guidance as - even though it's not perfect - it should finally stop activists being able to promote transgenderism at the expense of children's safety.

It's definitely social transition if the child's friendship group is doing it.

Edited to add, if it's only a nickname but no change in pronouns, that's not a social transition. Children (and adults) use nicknames all the time.

Safeguarding guidance determines that teachers should never promise confidentiality to children.

KCSIE specifically says that if a child tells a teacher that they feel like the opposite sex they can keep that confidential.

But the child is not able to source puberty blockers. Children are not given puberty blockers just because they want them.

Yes, I think you're right. My mistake. Puberty blockers can't be sourced unless parents help too - I think even Susie Green's "Ann" service requires parental involvement.

But there are forums telling children how to source cross-sex hormones instead of puberty blockers. Including homemade ones.

I'd forgotten (until just now) that one of Helen Webberley's recent nuggets of info was that children who can't access puberty blockers can access other means to alter their bodies. IIRC, she clarified that she meant cross-sex hormones.

So you said but your arguments, such as they are, are weak and unconvincing, there are good reasons for telling the parents, not to mention a legal requirement, you haven't given even one good reason to not follow the Child Protection procedures.

And 'honour' violence is committed by which people?

And those people are standing for which party in droves?

And that party is also pushing 'trans rights' and self ID?

One would wonder why the very same people who you're concerned about being violent to their kids for being trans are the very same people who are standing for a party who is pushing gender identity ideology.

Something doesn't sit right, one way or another.

Yes - that's in the new KCSIE draft and is an example of how transactivism has been able to influence policy.
Making a decision about keeping confidences is a challenge in schools. Many schools have a pastoral policy that simply tells adults they mustn't make a decision about confidentiality alone - they must share information concerns with pastoral / safeguarding staff. A principle of safeguarding is not to work alone - hence the multi agency approach and that is replicated in schools with effective safeguarding systems.

Expecting ECTs, TAs, lunchtime supervisors, first aiders etc to make a decision about keeping a child's confidence is a big ask. An individual teacher / adult is unlikely to know other relevant issues about a child's life to be able to assess whether there's a safeguarding risk. So good schools simply advise teachers to share concerning issues with experienced staff

The difference is, not whether it is socially transitioning, but logically if it is a children's friendship group they are the only ones who know.

Unless of course you have some idea about how children should be told, "educated" not to go along with what is happening between friends?

But once an adult is told, how they respond is hugely different.

Because, obviously they are an adult.

Surely that is a whole other discussion as to whether young people, who are still children should somehow be told that they should monitor what is said in their friendship group and if it appears to cross a boundary that adults have informed them is a boundary, that they should go to an adult. The teacher? Their parents? The parents of the child concerned?

Oh and to just underline -my post is in direct reference to @GlovedhandsCecilia highlighting that honour violence is prevalent in particular cultures.

'Honour' violence is committed by Islamists. Islamists are block-voting Green. Greens think self-ID is a fabulous plan.

Square that circle.

Oh also, noone can 'transition' because noone can change sex. It's all utter bollocks, stop using the language of it.

I'm a bit confused by your post and we may be talking at cross-purposes. I'm a secondary teacher.

Teachers can certainly overhear children being called by a different name or referred to by different pronouns without anyone officially telling them that a child is trans. That is probably even likely to happen before anything official happens through the school.

If a child is being called a different name and different pronouns by their friendship group, then that's effectively a social transition. But there is zero requirement if a teacher observes this, for the parents to be informed. I think parents should be informed given the associated risks, just as I would hope they would be informed if a child was spotted with signs of self-harm.

Thanks for replying.

I will admit I didn't think about the "overhearing" aspect.

But was concerned about the "guidelines" for teachers as it seems to me they are put in an if not impossible position, one that may conflict with their own judgement. ie as you said:

" ... there is zero requirement if a teacher observes this, for the parents to be informed. I think parents should be informed given the associated risks, just as I would hope they would be informed if a child was spotted with signs of self-harm. ... "

I'm very slow on the uptake, but why should the school care?

No collusion with social transition, no change of name or pronouns, no other-sex single sex activities and sports - why is it any of the school's business how a child identifies?

I'd probably record it on CPOMs these days if I overheard that sort of thing (luckily in my school it seems to have largely died out). People higher up the food chain would make the decision.