Compulsory sex lessons for primary school children as young as five are to be backed by the British government's official advisers on sexual behavior in an unpublished report. The proposals are the biggest shake-up in sex education to be proposed for schools in England and Wales.
The document says the current system for sex lessons, which is optional, is unfair, confused, damaging to pupils' health and development and partly responsible for Britain having the highest rate of teenage pregnancy in western Europe. At present a minority of pupils are given full details about subjects such as contraception and sexually transmitted infections, while the rest get only basic biological information.
A joint report from the Independent Advisory Group on Sexual Health, which advises the Department of Health, and the Independent Advisory Group on Teenage Pregnancy, which reports to ministers at the Department for Education and Skills, is proposing that detailed knowledge about sex become a routine part of all pupils' education.
The group's 42 members include senior doctors, experts in sexual behavior, specialists in bringing up children, nurses, and leading academics in the field. They want ministers to make Personal, Social and Health Education (PSHE) a statutory subject in all primary and secondary schools in England and Wales. Some schools provide PSHE to help prepare their students understand the adult world of sex, alcohol, drugs and bullying.
The Sex and Relationship Education (SRE) element of PSHE includes much more in-depth discussion about sexual activity than the factual reproductive biology all pupils cover in science lessons as well as tuition on how to deal with pressure from friends or partners to have sex, where to get contraception and how infections such as chlamydia and genital warts are passed on.
The report, Personal, Social and Health Education in schools: Time for Action, has been compiled by the Independent Advisory Groups on Sexual Health and Teenage Pregnancy, which advise the Department of Health and the Department for Education and Skills.
Joyce Gould, the Labour peer who chaired the two groups' combined inquiry, said on Saturday that the government should make PSHE a statutory part of the national curriculum in order to tackle the high number of teenage girls becoming pregnant, the rising levels of sexually transmitted infections and widespread ignorance among young people about sex.
Gould denied that the group's proposals would encourage promiscuity.
"Some people will say that if you don't tell them about it, they won't do it. But real life shows that's not the case. More and more young people are having sex at a younger age," she said.
Gill Frances, the chair of the teenage pregnancy advisors, said introducing SRE at all schools was vital to help understand complicated sexual issues. "Young people are growing up in an increasingly sexualized society, where there are mixed messages. On the one hand we are titillated and entertained by pictures of women's bodies and celebrities' sex lives, yet on the other a young person who gets pregnant or contracts an STI is vilified," she said.
Frances, the director of children's development at the National Children's Bureau, said schools and parents had a shared responsibility to prepare young people for the challenges of adult life by giving them the knowledge and skills to handle issues such as sex, diet, exercise and violence. Mandatory PSHE would make many young people more likely to postpone their first sexual experience, and more confident at engaging with the opposite sex.
It points out that teenage pregnancy in Liverpool, Bradford and Hackney, in east London, fell after schools introduced PSHE and SRE.
The report is likely to lead to tension in Whitehall. Education secretary Ruth Kelly, a devout Catholic, is thought likely to oppose such a dramatic extension of pupils' knowledge about sex.
DITCH TACTICS: Kenyan officers were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch suspected to have been deliberately dug by Haitian gang members A Kenyan policeman deployed in Haiti has gone missing after violent gangs attacked a group of officers on a rescue mission, a UN-backed multinational security mission said in a statement yesterday. The Kenyan officers on Tuesday were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch “suspected to have been deliberately dug by gangs,” the statement said, adding that “specialized teams have been deployed” to search for the missing officer. Local media outlets in Haiti reported that the officer had been killed and videos of a lifeless man clothed in Kenyan uniform were shared on social media. Gang violence has left
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including