Oona Stannard, Chief Executive & Director of the Catholic Education Service for England and Wales, has written to the Editor of the Catholic Herald following recent misleading reporting featured in that newspaper on 29 January 2010.

Dear Mr Coppen

Recent misleading reports regarding PSHE in Catholic schools

Misleading reports have recently appeared in the Catholic Herald regarding Personal, Social, Health and Economic (PSHE) Education, including Sex and Relationships Education (SRE) in Catholic schools. Such ill-informed comments undermine the good work being done in our schools and cause unnecessary anxiety to parents and the Catholic community at large.

The Catholic Education Service for England and Wales is fully committed to the promotion of the sanctity of life, in accordance with the teachings of the Church, and we expect that all our schools promote this message to their pupils. We have every confidence that Catholic schools do this and promote the protection of life from conception through, for example:

·         Determining what external parties operating on school premises can and cannot do, so that any information given is placed within the context of the Church’s teaching

·         Ensuring that SRE is taught in a manner appropriate to the Catholic ethos of the school

·         Promoting behaviour that is in line with the teachings of the Catholic Church

During our extensive negotiations with Government over the plans to make PSHE part of the national curriculum, we have been clear that the right of schools with a religious character to teach SRE in accordance with the ethos of their school must be retained and we have been assured that this will be the case. The Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families, Ed Balls, gave this assurance in the House of Commons on 11 January 2010:

“The decision to make sex and relationship education statutory is, I think, supported by all political parties, but it is essential that it is taught in line with the ethos, including the faith, of the school. That is clear in the legislation: it is clear that parents as well as school governors will have a say in how the subject is taught, while there is also a parental opt-out, which will apply to pupils until they are 15. I can thus give the hon. Gentleman the complete assurance that the school will be in charge of how to teach SRE, but the fact of teaching it will be in law and guaranteed to all children.”

We have every confidence that, if the Children, Schools and Families Bill is passed, making PSHE part of the national curriculum, Catholic schools will be entitled to continue to teach this subject in accordance with the teaching of the Catholic Church, and that the teaching of SRE in Catholic schools will always uphold the importance of the sanctity of life.

In a recent press briefing with the Catholic Herald, all these points were clarified and explained. 

Yours sincerely

Oona Stannard

Chief Executive & Director