Plans to overhaul official guidance on sex education in schools are blowing a perceived problem out of all proportion, teachers’ representatives have said.
The Department for Education (DfE) has set out proposals to introduce age ratings designed to prevent teachers covering some subject matter with younger children, as well as other measures, after the prime minister ordered the education secretary, Gillian Keegan, to bring forward a planned review.
Rishi Sunak did so in response to pressure from the Tory MP Miriam Cates, who claimed in the Commons earlier this month that children were being given “graphic lessons on oral sex, how to choke your partner safely and 72 genders”.
On Friday, Keegan declared herself “deeply concerned about reports of inappropriate lessons being taught in schools” and the DfE confirmed Cates’s statement in the Commons on 8 March was the grounds for its new proposals on relationships, sex, health and education (RSHE) guidance.
But the chief of the teaching union the Association of School and College Leaders said the claims were “overblown, sweeping and supported by evidence which is flimsy at best”.
