Welsh sex ed fight goes on

A legal challenge by Welsh parents concerning planned mandatory relationships and sex education (RSE) that includes LGBT+ teaching and gender ideology has failed – but an appeal is now underway.

Plans for compulsory RSE in Wales also removes parents’ legal rights to withdraw their children from explicit sex education classes – despite significant parental opposition.

The Curriculum and Assessment (Wales) Act 2021 prescribes mandatory elements in education which includes RSE. Several parents – members of the 5,000-strong parent and grandparent-led group Public Child Protection Wales – sued the Welsh Government following concerns that children as young as three will be taught about sensitive and inappropriate topics.

Mrs Justice Steyn, who handed down the High Court ruling in December, concluded that parents have no legal right to remove their children from sex education. She also ruled that the state’s legal obligation (under Article 2 of the First Protocol to the European Convention of Human Rights) to respect the right of parents ‘to ensure such education and teaching [is] in conformity with their own religious and philosophical convictions’, did not protect parental rights in the field of controversial sex education.

Kim Isherwood, one of the parents and the group’s spokesperson, said: ‘We asked the High Court to recognise the overreach of power by the government; we asked the court to help us protect our children from future emotional, physical, and psychological harm. The evidence we provided to the court referenced and highlighted concerning levels of betrayal, deceit and false claims made by the government, but it appears as though the judge agrees with them – not only do we parents not have rights, but they were never there to begin with.’

She confirmed an appeal will happen and said: ‘We will fight all the harder to protect our children from a dangerous woke agenda gone off the rails.’

Mrs Justice Steyn, who gave the ruling, decided that parents have no statutory right to withdraw their child from RSE; nor was there a fundamental common-law right to do so – and the court was ‘not prepared to develop such a right’.

She noted that the RSE course outline ‘specified that the teaching would be neutral from a religious and ideological perspective, and indoctrination was prohibited’, but the course would  not be value-neutral.  This, she found, was consistent with the requirement for pluralism in education and did not breach the prohibition on state indoctrination. ‘Pluralism is essential for the preservation of a modern liberal democracy, and this aim must be realised above all through state teaching’, she added.  

Lizzie Harewood is Executive Officer at the Association of Christian Teachers (ACT) and commented: ‘ACT are dismayed to hear that this ruling, which ignores the views of 90% of parents responding to the consultation, seeks to uphold the mandatory teaching of ideologically driven themes and material to children. 

‘Because the curriculum gives particular prominence to LGBTQ+ themes, this will also mean that Christian teachers will possibly be required to teach inappropriate themes and material. We pray that this unsafe and undemocratic ruling will be reconsidered.’