Academies Bill [HL]

I am not sure that I am able to give a very clear timetable. As part of the discussions that we need to have on the curriculum review, we need to decide how the experience and views of Members of this House can be fed in. I am happy to come back to the noble Baroness on that point. We need to work out how to do this. We have heard that there are issues to do with content as well as principle and I recognise that we will return to the matter. I am also struck, from listening to the debate, how far sex education at school has moved on since I was at school, when I seem to remember that I had a drawing of a hen and an egg and that was it. There has clearly been some progress since then. On the more specific and narrower point to do with academies, which is what this debate and the amendment are about, the independent schools’ standards regulations require all independent schools, including academies, to have a curriculum that includes personal, social and health education that reflects the school’s aims and ethos. Those regulations require the schools to prepare pupils adequately for the opportunities, responsibilities and experiences of adult life. That is important and those regulations are in place. We recognise the importance of this area to parents and pupils and believe that that is sufficient for academies to deliver an appropriate PSHE curriculum. We know that many academies already see that area as key to engaging pupils. Amendment 70 would have the effect, which may or may not have been intended, of removing any right of parental withdrawal from sex and relationship education. I know that there is a range of views on that. The noble Lord, Lord Howarth, expressed one set of views; I know that others will have equally strong views that parents should have the right to withdraw their children. I do not believe that creating a difference between the maintained and the academies sector by removing a right of withdrawal is justified and I am not sure that the noble Lord intended it. In any case, I hope that noble Lords will accept my reassurance that these important issues will be returned to as we think about the curriculum review more generally and that they will feel able not to press their amendments.