The Catholic Education Service for England and Wales has said it will continue to firmly uphold the position that parental rights remain vital in relation to Sex and Relationships Education (SRE).
The Catholic body was responding to the Government’s announcement that from September 2011, Personal, Social, Health and Economic (PSHE) education, including Sex and Relationships Education (SRE), will be compulsory in all schools, including Catholic schools.
The proposal will see parents lose the right to withdraw children from sex education once they reach 15. Up to now, parents had the right to withdraw their children from sex education.
In a statement, the CESEW said it welcomed “the Government’s reiteration of its support for the important principles underlining SRE, which emphasise that schools continue to have the legal right to determine the content of what is taught in PSHE within their schools, and that governing bodies retain the right to determine what is taught, and must determine this in line with the ethos of the school.”
It said that PSHE enables “factual information from reliable sources to be communicated and misinformation from peers or street culture or exploitation to be avoided.”
However, recognising that Sex and Relationships Education (SRE) is “a sensitive issue”, the CESEW said it continued to “wholeheartedly support the belief that parents are the first educators of their children", particularly in those most formative and critical years up until the age of 15.
It also underlined the significant roles and responsibilities of governing bodies on these issues.
Saying that while it was disappointed that legal encumbrances meant that a blanket right of withdrawal could no longer apply, the organisation added, "we are pleased that the Government has recognised that the right of withdrawal in formative years is most critical and is therefore providing for the ability of parents to opt-out of SRE up to the age of 15".
The CESEW said that as age and growing independence brings young people ever closer to pressures, advertising and coercion to behaviour which can undermine the healthy life of young people, “we are comforted in the knowledge that our schools and colleges will do an exceptional job in providing Sex and Relationships Education, set within the teachings of the Catholic Church”.
Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families, Mr Balls said that only a "very small minority" of parents choose to exercise the right to withdraw.
"What's happened over the past few decades is that the English courts have been saying it is important to strike a balance of the capacity of the young person to make their own decisions and the rights of the parents," he said.
Mr Balls added that it "doesn't make sense" in new legislation to retain parents' right to withdraw their child up until the age of 19, given that teenagers can vote at 18, and the age of consent is 16.
But Norman Wells, Director of the Family Education Trust criticised the proposals announced by Mr Balls, saying, "In his determination to impose his own agenda, Ed Balls is going against the fundamental principle in UK education law that parents are responsible for the education of their children and that pupils must be educated in accordance with the wishes of their parents."
