Elections: Registration

Baroness Massey of Darwen Excerpts

Tuesday 27th March 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, only this morning I was told by one Member of your Lordships’ House who spends time going out to schools that when talking with school students, one gets a very strong commitment to House of Lords reform. I recall that the Labour Party’s last manifesto committed it to House of Lords reform. I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Tomlinson, and others will maintain that strong commitment when they discuss the Bill this time next year. It seems to me sometimes that there is nothing else on the minds of noble Lords opposite.

[Baroness Massey of Darwen]

My Lords, is the Minister aware that, in a debate among young people in this House last year, there was a very strong vote against House of Lords reform? However, that is not my question. My question is: what progress is being made on the institution of citizenship education in schools as a compulsory subject?

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, successive Governments have struggled for some time with the whole issue of citizenship education in schools, and as the noble Baroness knows well, schools have struggled with how well PSHE as a whole is taught. I have asked about citizenship education and students tell me that they have had a bit on the European Union and a bit on Parliament in between the instruction on how they should behave in relations with the opposite sex. We all know that citizenship education remains a problem. It is a problem with which the Department for Education and others are grappling, but I encourage the noble Baroness to keep pushing.