Steve Brine attended a meeting held to discuss the future of sex and relationship education (SRE) on Primary Schools, held in the Commons on Thursday 24th November.
The meeting was addressed by a range of speakers, including Angela Tully from the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC), which advises parents and teachers who are concerned about the explicit nature of sex education in schools.
Speaking after the meeting, which was hosted by Andrea Leadsom MP, Steve said: "This is an issue that has been bubbling away for a number of years now, and I have been contacted by a number of local parents expressing their concerns. It is, of course, a very difficult issue for many parents to raise, and there is always the delicate balance between expressing concern for what your children are seeing and not being seen to rock the boat or wishing to alienate them among their school friends.
"I know the Department for Education is currently drafting new guidelines for schools on SRE, but among other things we are calling for a form of independent classification of the material shown in schools. The British Board of Film Classification seems to be best placed to rate this, and I am sure that this would give worried parents some peace of mind in knowing what their children were seeing.
"The bottom line for me, as an MP and a father of two young children, is that children at primary school are not sexual beings. To see at today's meeting some the films being shown to very young children every day in our primary schools was genuinely shocking. We are absolutely not asking Government to turn to the blunt instrument of legislation on this one but we are saying we think the status quo is quite wrong in some schools and we want to work with the Department and parents as well as pressure groups such as the SPUC to get these new guidelines right."
More information...
You can visit the SPUC (Society for the Protection of Unborn Children) to find out about the 'Safe at School' campaign via www.spuc.org.uk/campaigns/safeatschool.
