Personal, Social, Health and Financial Education

Debate between Ann Coffey and John Robertson

Wednesday 16th January 2013 Westminster Hall

[Ann Coffey (Stockport) (Lab)]

As parents, we want our children to be educated not only to achieve academic qualifications and skills but to make good choices in their personal relationships and lives.

Recent scandals, including the Rochdale and Jimmy Savile cases, have horrified people, but behind those scandals, and in other similar cases, we see the same picture. We find that sexual predators felt free to operate, partly because of institutional and cultural attitudes, whether in the BBC, the Church or agencies that were supposed to be protecting children, while children were left feeling powerless to complain. To meet that challenge we need a big cultural change in this country to protect the children of the future. One of the ways we can help to do that is with good compulsory PSHE in schools. The knowledge that PSHE gives children will help to prevent further Rochdale and Jimmy Savile scandals.

As well as giving children the knowledge to make better choices about their personal lives, PSHE gives them the knowledge to protect themselves against inappropriate relationships, whether from their peers or adults, and the confidence to speak out. Quite rightly, cases such as those of Rochdale and Jimmy Savile have led to strong public revulsion that such things happened to our children, and there is a public mood to ensure that we do all we can to stop it happening again. We must not miss this moment by downgrading PSHE in schools. I support the calls for PSHE to be made a compulsory part of the curriculum.

Schools have a critical role in keeping children safe by talking to them about issues such as sexual consent, sexual coercion and exploitation, and how to shape healthy relationships and respect for each other, as well as alerting children to signs of when they are being sexually groomed. The focus needs to be on both boys and girls. Boys need to be supported to form positive and respectful attitudes to girls, especially to counter the widespread availability of pornography—a point stressed by the recent cross-party inquiry into unwanted pregnancies.

Compulsory sex and relationship education in schools would give more children the confidence to speak out and reject inappropriate relationships—not only grooming by older men for sexual exploitation, but sexually coercive relationships with their peers. The issue of what constitutes sexual consent is important. Many boys watch pornographic sites in which there is often a violent element to sexual relationships, and it is not clear that they understand the nature of consent.

I pointed out in a recent Commons debate that one third of all 16 to 18-year-old girls have experienced groping or unwanted sexual touching in schools. In 2009, a Home Office opinion poll on violence against women revealed that one in five people think it is acceptable in certain circumstances for a man to hit or slap his female partner in public in response to her being dressed in sexy or revealing clothing.

I know the Government have indicated that they do not want to make PSHE statutory, but the problem with not doing so is that our children are subject to a random postcode lottery. Schools in some areas, like my own in Stockport, are delivering high-quality PSHE and sex and relationship education, but others, sadly, are not. Such education should be available to all children in all schools.

It is now a year since the PSHE consultation closed, and the ongoing uncertainty, alongside the Government’s commitment to drive through the English baccalaureate, holds massive risks for the teaching of PSHE in schools. Evidence is emerging that important subjects that are not part of the baccalaureate are being squeezed out of the curriculum, which is worrying. A 2011 survey of 2,500 teachers by the NASUWT revealed that 43% of schools had axed or severely reduced provision of some subject areas as a result of the new baccalaureate. A reduction in the provision of art, music, religious education, citizenship and drama was reported, with an 11% decline reported in planned PSHE provision.

The proposed cut to PSHE provision could not come at a worse time, and not only for keeping our children safe, which is my main concern. We need a more holistic approach to education. Of course it is right that children achieve academic qualifications such as the English baccalaureate, but they also need to be given the knowledge to meet the challenges of an increasingly complex, global and risky world. We need to prepare children for the realities they will face. Most importantly, we need to give them the knowledge to keep themselves safe and healthy.

What is the value of a child getting a top English baccalaureate if he or she cannot recognise when they are being sexually groomed or bullied and are unable confidently to make good personal relationships? PSHE helps young people to cope with that world and will increase their confidence in being able to deal with it. Constructive and important work is already being done in many schools. The more information that children and young people receive in schools to prepare them for the world that they face, the better, but it is not being done everywhere, and it should be. The situation must not be allowed to get worse because of the move to a new baccalaureate that squeezes out all but core subjects.

[John Robertson (in the Chair)]

I thank colleagues for being disciplined, and I hope that the last two speakers will follow their example.