Faith Schools and Sex Education

posted: 28/04/2009

Sex education is to be made compulsory in all state schools in England but faith schools will also be free to preach against sex outside marriage and homosexuality, under government proposals.

'Values' and Lessons Opt-outs

The plans to make personal, social and health education (PSHE) compulsory from the age of five, published yesterday, include a clause allowing schools to apply their "values" to the lessons and another allowing parents to opt their children out on religious grounds.

Mixed messages

It means that all state secondaries in England - including faith schools - will for the first time have to teach a core curriculum about sex and contraception in the context of teenagers' relationships, but teachers in religious schools will also be free to tell them that sex outside marriage, homosexuality or using contraception are wrong. Sexual health campaigners warned that such an approach could confuse teenagers, but Catholic schools welcomed the move.

Government review

The government-commissioned review by Sir Alasdair Macdonald, headteacher of Morpeth school in east London, on how to make PSHE compulsory, concludes that schools will be legally obliged to teach pupils about health and nutrition, safety, drugs and alcohol and sex education.

For the first time pupils will be taught how to stay safe - from tackling cyber-bullying to resisting pressure to join gangs - and how to manage their bank accounts.

But the most controversial element is making sex education compulsory. The plans have divided faith groups and safer sex campaigners who highlight the fact that Britain has one of the highest teenage pregnancy rates in Europe.

Changes

An optional curriculum in secondaries covering sex, both homosexual and heterosexual relationships, and contraception will be made compulsory - previously schools had to teach only the fundamentals of reproduction, contraception and puberty in science lessons. A new curriculum for primary schools will include teaching five-year-olds about different kinds of relationships, managing their emotions and about physical changes to their bodies in childhood.

Taught through faith values

Faith schools will be allowed to deliver the lessons in line with the "context, values and ethos" of their religion, the report says. Parents will also retain the right to withdraw their child from sex education lessons, meaning some children will continue to miss out altogether.

Macdonald said: "What we're trying to do, and I accept it's difficult, is find a balance between young people having an entitlement to knowledge, facts, information but where schools, particularly schools with a particular faith interest or other disposition, also have a right to put that in context of their particular institution. "

Faith school pupils will lose out

A Marie Stopes spokesman, Tony Kerridge, said: "We are very pleased that it has become part of the core curriculum. It is absolutely important that we grasp this nettle. The vast majority of children go to mainstream schools but for those who attend faith schools, this is a lost opportunity to have that caveat."

Young people's right to sex education trumped by parents

Macdonald's report also backs the current system of allowing parents to opt their children out of sex education. Currently 0.04% of pupils are withdrawn from lessons, usually on religious grounds. The move was opposed by children's rights campaigners. Adam Lonsdale, a 16-year-old member of the Youth Parliament, said: "No parent or school should be able to prevent a young person receiving good, high-quality sex and relationship education."

Catholics satisfied

Oona Stannard, director of the Catholic Education Service for England and Wales, said: "PSHE is a very important part of a child's education and it should be in the curriculum, but the approach to what is taught ought to be in line with the wishes of parents and should uphold the ethos of the particular school."

The fact that Catholics are not criticising the governemt's proposals indicates they have lobbied successfully. Whether their schools' gay, bisexual, or not yet sure pupils (among others) will get the sex and relationship education and support they need is another matter. Most pupils in catholic schools will not be practicing Catholics in adulthood. Significant numbers of pupils in Catholic and other faith schools are not members of that faith. Tax payers pay most of the costs of faith schools.

The schools secretary, Ed Balls, accepted the proposals and said they will now be subject to consultation.

Download the report Independent review of making PSHE education statutory 958KB pdf
To respond to the consultation on this department's website you need to register and sign in. The consultation deadline is unknown and this consultation is not yet listed. 

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Prescriptions, HIV and Charges

posted: 10/03/2009

The British Medical Association has branded as pointless the Department of Health's consultation on making everyone with a long-term condition exempt from prescription charges. 

It says this is a waste of time and energy and the government should just make all remaining prescriptions free once more. Just 1 in 10 prescriptions are now paid for and this will fall even more because cancer patients will get free prescriptions from 1 April.

In Wales and Scotland all prescription charges have either already been abolished or are about to be abolished.

HIV treatment costs

Since the start of this year Greater Manchester HIV clinics (among other HIV clinics) have stopped prescribing any drugs except those for HIV and their treatment side effects. People must now turn to a GP for prescriptions for all other healthcare needs, such as depression amd anxiety, and sexual dysfunction. 

For some people with HIV this means paying for these prescriptions - some people are exempt, some are exempt because of low income, and some people can buy a discount card. Find out what help is available with English prescription charges here.

The charging review

The Prescription Charges Review will consider how to implement prime minister Brown's commitment to exempt patients with long-term conditions (LTCs) from prescription charges over the next few years following the exemption for cancer patients.

It will consider:

• how to define the range of long term conditions affecting patients that should be exempted from prescription charges;
• how exemption from charging can best be phased in, with due regard to:
  - what is in the best interests of patients
  - the potential impact on the wider health care system
  - implications for existing policies on management of long term conditions
  - implications for public expenditure

The review will report to the Minister for Public Health and the Secretary of State for Health in Summer 2009.

It would be good to have your say on exempting HIV as a longterm condition from prescription charges but it seems the Deaprtment of Health doesn't want to hear - there is no way to feed your views to the department at the consultation page.

Last September Gordon Brown announced that “as over the next few years the NHS generates cash savings in its drugs budget we will plough savings back into abolishing charges for all patients with long-term conditions”.  The Department of Health has established the Prescription Charges Review, chaired by Sir Ian Gilmore, to make recommendations on how this policy will be implemented. 

Charging by diagnosis or disability

The idea that we should discriminate in levels of charges according to diagnosis or disability is fundamentally misconceived. Herpes is a chronic condition. So are HIV and ME.

TB and syphilis are perhaps not chronic conditions because they can be treated and people cured, but it is in the interest of the rest of the population that people take their treatments properly and become clear of infections.

Continuing to restrict help with prescription charges to save money is a false economy. Despite the help available, the simple existence of charges is enough of a barrier to put off some of the poorest and most vulnerable. 

George House Trust supports the BMA argument, prescription charging has reached the point where the income from charging isn't worth the administrative and other costs of collection. Scotland and Wales are already seeing the benefits of free prescriptions. We don't need a review, we need prescription charges in England scrapped.

Department of Health Consultation

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