PSHE Association vows to step up statutory status campaign

The PSHE Association has today vowed to step up its campaigning activity in response to reports in yesterday’s Independent which suggested that the Government is considering rejecting statutory status for PSHE Education. Strong recommendations for statutory status were made by the Education Select Committee earlier this year, and statutory status is supported by 90% of parents and 92% of young people as well as over 100 leading bodies.

The Government has committed to a response to the Education Select Committee by the end of this year and a Government source quoted in yesterday’s article suggested that making the subject statutory now “seems unlikely”. Instead, the source suggested increased emphasis on PSHE and SRE as part of Ofsted inspection criteria.

Such measures were labelled as ‘half-hearted’ by Sarah Green from the End Violence Against Women and Girls Coalition. Speaking in advance of Wednesday’s International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women and Girls, Ms Green suggested that “Every expert who is familiar with the risk of abuse faced by young people, from their peers and from adults, as well as the pressures created by new technology” wanted statutory status.

The PSHE Association has committed to stepping up its campaign in light of this latest development, starting by writing to the Department for Education to clarify the Government’s position and urging supporters to write to the Prime Ministers to take urgent action to make the subject statutory.

PSHE Association Chief Executive Joe Hayman said:

“Now is the time for us to step up our campaign for statutory status for PSHE education as there are still clearly people within Government who we need to persuade. I have written to Nicky Morgan about this report today and will be talking with national partners about our response over the coming days. We will contact our members about further campaigning action shortly.”

Read the Independent article in full here.