Relationship Education in Schools

Debate between Joe Morris and Anna Dixon

Tuesday 1st April 2025 Westminster Hall

[Joe Morris (Hexham) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship for the second time this afternoon, Sir Jeremy. I thank the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Helen Maguire) for securing this important debate. A couple of weeks ago, at Prime Minister’s questions, my hon. Friend the Member for Knowsley (Anneliese Midgley) noted the significance of “Adolescence”, the series produced by Stephen Graham and starring Christine Tremarco that I think has touched all hon. Members. I strongly support my hon. Friend’s call for screenings in schools. It is crucial to spark conversation, education and urgent change around online male radicalisation, and violence against women and girls. Like, I hope, everyone in this Chamber, I was assured and pleased by the Prime Minister’s response.

I recognise that a real and abhorrent problem is being perpetuated in our society. We are experiencing an epidemic of gender-based violence. We have had a disjointed approach to tackling that epidemic, and that approach has failed. We have failed to protect women and girls from violence, failed to improve outcomes for victims and failed to combat deep-rooted sexism and misogyny across the UK. Instead, I see from my casework an increase in peer-on-peer abuse cases in primary and secondary schools.

Schools should be safe spaces and provide a secure environment for children to learn—places that parents should feel comfortable sending their children. We need to ensure that safeguarding is in place to ensure that protection. Children going to school and experiencing abuse is despicable and inexcusable. We need to urgently look at how we address these issues, and the curriculum must ensure that exposure to social media and online platforms providing violent, misogynistic, racist and homophobic content can be properly countered.

I want to briefly mention the family of Holly Newton—a constituent of mine who was tragically murdered by her former boyfriend—who campaign tirelessly to raise awareness around recognising signs of domestic abuse. I associate myself with the calls from Holly’s mum for lowering the age that teenagers can be considered domestic abuse victims. When I look out my office window on Beaumont Street in Hexham, there is a wonderful installation of ribbons dedicated to victims of domestic abuse, with a single ribbon for Holly of a different colour, to emphasise that she is not counted in those statistics. It is something incredibly moving whenever I look at it.

Since I was elected I have worked with Northumberland domestic abuse services, which provide valuable support to some of the most vulnerable people across England’s most sparsely populated county. I have spoken to many people in this Chamber about the rural issues we face with addressing those unique challenges. The staff and volunteers at NDAS are truly some of the most inspirational people I have met in my short time in this House.

When I go out and visit schools across the constituency, whether in the more urbanised parts of the Tyne valley belt, or in the far-flung north or south of the constituency, one of the things that teachers express to me is a concern that male students are being bombarded with this toxic view of the world. I was born in 1991, and I consider myself to be relatively young. I grew up when Facebook was still a new thing, and for someone to get their first Facebook account they almost had to have a chat with their mum and dad about it to get their sign-off.

I was exposed to what we thought was an online revolution, but it was a drip feed compared to the tsunami that this generation are exposed to. For this generation to have been through the pandemic, and now to go through this, is incredibly concerning and shocking. It makes me realise how much the world has shifted under our feet in the decade and a half since I was in the education system.

[Anna Dixon]

Did my hon. Friend hear Gareth Southgate talking in the Richard Dimbleby lecture about the fact that boys need positive male role models in the real world—people like football coaches, scout leaders, youth club leaders and more male teachers? I wondered if my hon. Friend would agree that having real-world role models would help boys in the face of that tsunami of online abuse?

[Joe Morris]

It will probably not surprise my hon. Friend to know that I have seen everything that Gareth Southgate has said since he left being England manager. My fiancée had to talk me into taking down a mocked-up Time “Man of the Year” Gareth Southgate work of art, shortly after she moved in—I think I am getting dragged slightly off course.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Joe Morris and Anna Dixon

Monday 9th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Anna Dixon (Shipley) (Lab)]

8. What steps she is taking to reform skills training.

[Joe Morris (Hexham) (Lab)]

10. What steps she is taking to reform skills training.