Education

Shabana Mahmood Excerpts

Wednesday 20th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Shabana Mahmood (Birmingham, Ladywood) (Lab)]

I spoke about RSE and the issues relating to it most recently in a Westminster Hall debate. It is fair to say that that speech gained quite a social media reaction, and the past couple of weeks have been a difficult and challenging experience: difficult because I have been forced to confront head-on the appalling reality that my comments and, in a number of instances, the reporting on my comments has led some to think me a homophobe; and challenging because I have felt that my intentions, which were to get a fair hearing for everyone and give voice to people who have felt excluded from a process, have been both lost and misunderstood.

Let me be clear: I think RSE should be taught in schools; that the curriculum should be inclusive of all, and that includes the LGBT community; and that all of it should be taught at the right age and in the right way. I continue to call out in the strongest terms the homophobic banners, chanting and hostile protests at Parkfield School in Birmingham, because they are wrong and feed the very prejudices that I want to help to eradicate. I am happy to discuss, debate and listen to all communities, but I have been a little taken aback by some of the comments made about my position, some of which have been quite simply untrue.

My involvement first came about when a large number of parents turned up at my weekly advice surgery in January. They had come to share with me their concerns about a lack of proper engagement ahead of changes to RSE at the schools their kids attend and the delivery of education under the purview of the Equality Act. They were measured and respectful, but also genuinely angry and frustrated. Why? Because there had been a breakdown of trust between the school leadership and the parent body. It was, and is, my hope to restore that bond of trust, but we must all reflect on and learn from how it came to pass. It is not a breakdown born of bigotry or hate; it is one born, for the most part, of a failure of process, policy and oversight.

Under the new guidelines, schools will make choices about what they think the best approach is; indeed, a variety of approaches will be developed, all achieving the same end but in different ways. It is imperative that there is honesty and trust between schools and parents. If a school leadership team oversells and overstates, or undersells and understates, what is required, in order to duck challenging conversations about the choices and discretion that the law allows them, we will have conflict where there need be none.

We need to bottom-out what good consultation looks like, because in my part of Birmingham there are many examples of bad consultation. I have been heartbroken to see the contempt with which some parents in my constituency have been treated. Some deeply troubling and discriminatory assumptions—that because these people look a certain way, they will think a certain way —lie at the heart of that treatment.

So, where is the dispute resolution process to fix this mess? Any sensible person would say that we must either construct a system designed to stop disputes occurring in the first place, or have a system to deal with them once they have occurred. What we actually have is a system that assumes there will not be any disputes at all. That does a disservice to everyone, not least of all the children. Where they still exert control, local education authorities can respond and move quickly to ensure that everyone is represented within a structure that is designed to stop disputes and foster a sense of shared mission between different minority communities, but academies are not designed in that way, and that is a real problem.

It is a matter of profound regret to me that the clash between rights and the role of the state, and the issue of whether all our protected characteristics are protected equally, have found themselves played out in our classrooms. The question of what happens when there is a clash remains. If others, like me, happen to think it is not possible to Twitter-storm out of existence everyone with a view different from their own, a different approach is required—one that is focused on dispute resolution, negotiation, compromise and reconciliation.

It is terrible to see communities pitted against one another. We cannot allow hard-won advances for the LGBT community to be quietly rolled back, but nor can we allow faith to be re-badged as bigotry or shout down those with sincere questions or concerns. Hard conversations cannot be avoided forever. This very institution must ultimately be the one that reconciles the competing rights and needs of different groups, which is what the guidance clearly seeks to achieve. My fear, though, is that without more, it will fall short.

[Several hon. Members rose—]