Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Lord Katz Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 16th September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Blower (Lab)]

My Lords, given that my noble friend Lady Lister is unable to be here this evening, it is my pleasure, with her permission, to read her speech to move this amendment.

It is an honour to move Amendment 463, which would extend the provision of relationships and sex education to young people aged under 16, in post-16 institutions in England. It is an honour because it has been dubbed the Massey amendment as a tribute to our late friend and colleague Baroness Massey of Darwen. Had she still been with us, she would have been the ideal person to move this amendment, given her experience and commitment to young people’s social health and well-being. It was to honour Doreen that I agreed to table this amendment, even though I do not claim any expertise in this area.

Another reason that I agreed to table the amendment was that I was so impressed by how Faustine Petron, who approached me, founded the Make It Mandatory campaign and enlisted the support of many important bodies such as Brook—of which Lady Massey was a former president—the Sex Education Forum and the End Violence Against Women and Girls coalition. She has received the endorsement for this amendment of 50 organisations, and has collected over 105,000 signatures for her petition. She says, in her own words:

“I am a university student and young survivor of domestic abuse. As an older teenager, I would have benefited from being provided with RSE after year 11 and an adequate education surrounding the early warning signs of domestic abuse, the different forms abuse can take, and places to get help”.


The third reason is that Faustine Petron has such a strong case: she has identified a real gap in the mandatory provision of relationships and sex education, which does not cover 16 and 17 year-olds, yet, under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, these are still children.

Since RSE was made mandatory in schools, it has begun to make a real difference. The Office for Students is making it into a condition of registration for universities that they intend to prevent and address sexual violence. Filling the gap in FE and sixth-form colleges would contribute to a preventative strategy on sexual violence among young people.

This would also help address the concern voiced by the Public Accounts Committee that,

“to date, the approach to tackling violence against women and girls has not put enough emphasis on preventative measures that are necessary to achieve long-term change”.

The committee emphasised the key role that education can play in tackling this issue, including in preventing children from becoming perpetrators in the future. Among its recommendations was that the Department for Education should set out how it intends to work with children and young people to prevent violence against women and girls, including further changes to the relationships and sex education curriculum. Some 77% of young people surveyed—

[Lord in Waiting/Government Whip (Lord Katz) (Lab)]

My Lords, I apologise to the noble Baroness for interjecting relatively late into her remarks, but I am reminded that, in the Companion, it is fairly clear that Members should not seek to have their speeches read by other Members of the House. Perhaps she could rephrase her remarks in a way that makes it clear that she is speaking for herself, not on behalf of another Peer.

[Baroness Blower (Lab)]

I apologise to the Committee. Clearly, I and possibly the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, had misunderstood the rules relating to this.

As has been noted, national organisations backing the Make It Mandatory campaign, in addition to the Children’s Commissioner, all agree that the extension of relationships and sex education to this group would be important.

In conclusion, in a recent Commons debate on relationships education in schools, the Minister for School Standards emphasised the vital role that education plays in preventing violence and that the aim of relationships education is to support all young people to build positive relationships and to keep themselves safe. That education must equip them for adult life. It thus makes no sense that, just as they are at the cusp of adult life, they should not be assured access to relationships and sex education to help equip them. The Minister continued that, as part of the Government’s opportunity mission,

“we will equip our young people and children with the skills they need to form strong, positive relationships”.—[Official Report, Commons, 1/4/25; col. 112WH.]

Although she was talking about the school context, this is clearly important in terms of an extension to post-16.

Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill

Lord Katz Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 18th September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

My Lords, I formally move the amendment in the name of my noble friend Lord Lucas and I will speak to it in my closing remarks.

[Lord in Waiting/Government Whip (Lord Katz) (Lab)]

I think we have yet to have a full discussion on Amendment 483, as well as Amendment 483A, so perhaps we could proceed to that discussion.

[Lord Macpherson of Earl’s Court (CB)]

My Lords, I will speak briefly in support of Amendment 483, which I have put my name to. The noble Lord, Lord Layard, has set out the arguments very eloquently. I would merely like to add the perspective of a former Treasury official.

Economic growth, or the lack of it, lies at the heart of the country’s problems. Without it, we simply will not be able to afford the costs of an ageing population. The Government will be forced to raise taxes even more than they already have and public services will deteriorate further, alienating an already alienated electorate. There is little the Government can do to promote growth in the short term. As an open economy, Britain is likely to grow only as fast as global demand permits, and we all know the effect of increased protectionism, but the Government can do something about the medium and long term.

We all know what drives growth: good infrastructure, competition, innovation, and a sensible tax system—but, above all, skills. Successive Governments have done a good job on education. Attainment in schools has improved and there has been a dramatic expansion in university education over the last 50 years, which, for the most part, has been reflected in the living standards of graduates. However, that still leaves 50% of school leavers who do not go to university who are poorly served by a vocational educational system that compares badly with our competitors’.

Technical and further education has never been prioritised sufficiently, and I can understand why. The media, the Government and the Civil Service are all dominated by graduates. Technical education is not sexy. The lags in the impact of any reform are long and variable. The plain fact is that there are not many votes in it, but sometimes Governments can do the right thing for future generations. I welcome recent announcements by the Government of a youth guarantee and the extra support for skills in the spending review, but they need to go further. An apprenticeship guarantee provides a golden opportunity to make a step change in provision and long-term economic performance.

I recognise that money is hard to come by, but the Treasury is an economics ministry as well as a finance ministry, and it needs some positive announcements to offset the inevitable gloom in the forthcoming Budget. I encourage the Minister and her department to engage actively with the Treasury. It should be possible to, for example, tweak the apprenticeship levy to give it a greater youth focus. If the money cannot be found now, the Government should at least set out a timetable, and if they cannot set out a timetable, they can at least sign up to the objective.

As the noble Lord, Lord Layard, said, a previous Government passed the Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Act 2009. It can be done, and I call on the Minister to act.