Parental Involvement in Teaching: Equality Act

Debate between Lloyd Russell-Moyle and Roger Godsiff

Tuesday 25th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Godsiff]

I have made it clear that I am not giving way.

The parents therefore had their own meeting and, after asking the brother of one parent who is in the property business and is well educated and articulate, to be the co-ordinator, they began their protests, on which I will touch in a minute. The common theme that links these two schools is that parents at both schools were neither consulted nor involved in how the nine protected characteristics were to be imparted to children. Parents were excluded entirely from the process, although the Equality Act is not an exam subject, for example, like English or mathematics.

All schools call regular meetings of parents when they want to inform them about important issues. It is part and parcel of school life for regular meetings to take place with parents, but no meetings with parents were held at the two schools.

[Lloyd Russell-Moyle (Brighton, Kemptown) (Lab/Co-op)]

Will he give way?

[Mr Godsiff]

I will not.

The question that those who have sought to characterise the disputes at both schools as a clash of cultures should be asking is, what have the headteachers and their staff at 256 primary schools got right with the support of their parents, while in two schools it seems to have gone very wrong? I turn briefly to the protests outside the school in my constituency.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Godsiff]

No, I have given way on a lot of things.

Furthermore, the police who were present wore body cameras and were asked by the organisers of the protest to check whether any placards contravened the law. I understand that only one placard was deemed inappropriate at an early protest, and the people carrying the banner were told not to bring it again.

I make these points because I believe the parents have not had a fair chance to put their side of the dispute. They have been branded professional agitators, accused by a councillor of not having children at the school, called a “mob” and told that they are spewing out homophobic hatred. These mothers have been smeared, and the fact that the local Member of Parliament, having weighed up the evidence and listened to all sides of the argument, came to the conclusion that the people protesting had just reason to complain and protest merely added a target for the witch hunters and increased the lust for a sacrifice, irrespective of the facts.

I return to a couple of specific questions, which I supplied to the Minister before the debate. I ask these questions because I suspect many primary school head- teachers watching this debate, like their colleagues in Birmingham, want to know whether they are inadvertently contravening the law in how they impart the nine protected characteristics of the Equality Act to their pupils.

As I have said, 256 of 258 primary schools in Birmingham are, in different ways, ensuring that their pupils know when they transfer to secondary school that any form of discrimination, victimisation, prejudice or bullying of other people who fall within the nine protected characteristics is unlawful. They do this by engaging with parents to explain the nine characteristics, by having workshops about the individual characteristics, by having ongoing consultations with the parents and showing them the type of material they propose to use, and by engaging with parents about what age is most appropriate for the various characteristics.

[Lloyd Russell-Moyle]

Have you read the material?

[Mr Godsiff]

I will come to that point in a minute.

The parents want clarification. First, they want to know whether it is permissible for headteachers to partner with parents to decide how the nine protected characteristics are imparted to pupils, bearing in mind that parents cannot have any veto over which characteristics are taught. Secondly, they would like to know whether the nine protected characteristics have to be taught all together, or whether they can be spread out and imparted to pupils throughout their time in primary school, taking into account at what age the head and/or parents consider it most age-appropriate for each protected characteristic to be imparted to the children.

I ask those questions because many primary heads are looking at what has happened at the two schools where controversy has arisen and do not want to be accused of discrimination, which is of course illegal, in the way they deal with the Equality Act and the nine protected characteristics. I would be grateful for clarity from the Minister, because this will affect the relationships education provision that comes in in 2020 and that can be introduced in September 2019, which is much more specific about the terms “consultation” and “age appropriateness”.

I have no opinion on the ages at which primary school children should be introduced to the provisions of the nine protected characteristics. For example, I attended a recent meeting held by the headteachers’ union here in the Commons, in Committee Room 9. A headteacher—he may have been a deputy head—from Manchester argued forcefully that the whole “age appropriate” concept should be scrapped completely and that children aged two should be introduced to the provisions of the protected characteristics. If the parents of the children involved are happy with that, who am I to say it should not happen? But parents, who in international law have the prime responsibility for the upbringing of their children, have to be partners with schools in the making of such decisions.

Likewise, I have no prescribed views about what teaching materials should be used. I believe that schools and parents should make the decision after proper consultation, which is what is currently happening in most schools. In respect of the question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle) from a sedentary position earlier, yes, I have now read most of the books that my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty) has given to me. Some of them are very good—“The Little Mermaid” is particularly good, and I have just got a copy for my grandchild—but my Muslim constituents would like to talk through some of the other books with the school to understand what the concepts are. They cannot talk it through with the school if the school will not have consultation.

I regret the controversies that have arisen around the two schools in Birmingham. I believe they could have been avoided if the schools had taught the provisions of the Equality Act in different ways and taken the parents’ concerns into account. For my part, I apologise unreservedly for any offence caused to any person of whatever sexual orientation by anything I have said or written. In particular, I apologise unreservedly to members of the LGBT community in Birmingham and throughout the country for anything I may have said or written that has caused offence to them. I assure you, Mr Speaker, that it most certainly was not intended.