Personal, Social, Religious, and Political Education Bill

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Repeal former PSHE and sex education acts, to create a new religious studies subject for KS3 students and modify the assessment procedure for the GCSE equivalent, to create a new citizenship subject, to create a new Politics GCSE, to reform PSHE into PSE and divide the content between KS3 and KS4, and for connected purposes.

BE IT ENACTED by the King’s most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:—

Section 1: Definitions

(1) In this Act, unless specified otherwise;

(2) An ‘Individual Curriculum’ refers to the definition established under Section 6 of the Exam Board (Reorganisation) Act 2022

(3) The ‘Exams Authority’ refers to the body established under Section 3(1) of the Exam Board (Reorganisation) Act 2022

Section 2: Repeals

(1) The Sex Education Reform Act 2015 is hereby repealed in full.

(2) The Key Stage 4 PSHE Act 2015 is hereby repealed in full

(3) The PSHE Modernisation Act 2018 is hereby repealed in full

Section 3: Religious Studies

(1) A new subject known as ‘Religious Studies’ shall be taught at KS3 for the purposes of teaching children about religion.

(2) The content of the subject is to be decided by individual schools, but should contain a fair, equal, and broad curriculum designed to create respectful discussion and learning on religions within the UK, and should be taught for a minimum of one hour every two weeks.

(2) The content of the subject is to be decided by individual schools, but should contain a fair, equal, and broad curriculum designed to create respectful discussion and learning on religions within the UK, and should be taught for a minimum of one hour every two weeks or an equivalent time frame.

(3) The Theology GCSE shall become an optional Religious Studies GCSE designed for further exploration of faith based ideas and discussions on religion.

(4) Where an individual curriculum does not apply, the following assessment criteria for the Religious Studies GCSE shall apply, unless the Exams Authority is following the instructions of the Secretary of State or has determined that provisions for assessment are insufficient;

(a) 70% of the final grade shall be conducted via written examination, with details to be confirmed by the Exams Authority
(b) 30% of the final grade shall be conducted via a recorded group oral examination in the form of a ten minute debate on religion between no fewer than three individuals and no more than seven individuals, with the marking criteria to be made clear in advance by the Exams Authority.
(i) Schools may split the students into groups to comply with the above debate assessment in whatever manner they see fit.
(ii) Students are required to state their student number in advance of the debate
(iii) Examiners are required to listen only to an audio recording, but unless the school informs the Exams Authority of a valid reason otherwise the school must also record video, to be reviewed by an individual separate to the examiner to ensure that any criteria set by the Exams Authority has been met.

(5) The Exams Authority shall set the content for the Religious Studies GCSE, in line with instructions from the Secretary of State, to be used in schools that do not have an individual curriculum in place.

Section 4: Civic Education

(1) A new subject known as Civics or Citizenship shall be taught in Years 8 and 9 for the purposes of teaching children about the political system of the UK

(2) The content is to be decided by individual schools but must promote healthy political debate or discussion on political systems and parties, taught for at least half an hour every two weeks.

(2) The content is to be decided by individual schools but must promote healthy political debate or discussion on political systems and parties, taught for at least half an hour every two weeks or an equivalent time frame.

(3) The content must be broad and must, at minimum, contain the following:

(a) The process of passing legislation into law
(b) How elections to the House of Commons function
(c) The responsibilities and powers of each House in Parliament
(d) How elections to local government function
(e) The role and responsibility of local governments, in particular the local authority within which the school is teaching

(4) Schools may also consider including the following in the content:

(a) The history of the UK political system from 1900 onwards
(b) How the devolved legislatures work and their relationship with the Westminster government
(c) The role and responsibility of local governments, in particular the local authority within which the school is teaching
(c) How political parties typically function

(5) There shall exist an optional Politics GCSE designed to explore politics in depth and build upon the content referred to above.

(6) Where an individual curriculum is not in place, the Exams Authority shall be responsible for developing the content of the GCSE in line with any instructions from the Secretary of State.

(7) Where an individual curriculum does not apply, the following assessment criteria for the Politics GCSE shall apply, unless the Exams Authority is following the instructions of the Secretary of State or has determined that provisions for assessment are insufficient;

(a) 75% of the final grade shall be conducted via written examination, with details to be confirmed by the Exams Authority
(b) 25% of the final grade shall be conducted via a recorded oral examination in the form of a five minute presentation on the main political structures of a country of the student’s choice, with the marking criteria to be made clear in advance by the Exams Authority.
(i) Students are required to state their student number in advance of the presentation
(ii) Examiners are required to listen only to an audio recording, but unless the school informs the Exams Authority of a valid reason otherwise the school must also record video, to be reviewed by an individual separate to the examiner to ensure that any criteria set by the Exams Authority has been met.

Section 5: Personal and Social Education

(1) A new subject, known as Personal and Social Education (or PSE) shall be taught in Key Stage 3 and Key Stage 4 for at least half an hour every week for the purposes of personal development on key issues relating to teenagerhood and adulthood.

(1) A new subject, known as Personal and Social Education (or PSE) shall be taught in Key Stage 3 and Key Stage 4 for at least half an hour every week or an equivalent time frame every two weeks for the purposes of personal development on key issues relating to teenagerhood and adulthood.

(2) Schools shall decide the mode of delivery and general content but in Key Stage 3 must include age-appropriate information on:

(a) Sexual relationships and safe sex, including:
(i) Pregnancy
(ii) Contraceptives
(iii) STDs or STIs
(iv) Consensual sex and recognising rape
(b) Puberty
(c) Mental health issues, including depression and anxiety
(d) Pornography and its relation to real sexual relationships
(i) No pornography shall be shown in class
(e) LGBTQ issues
(f) Online Safety, including:
(i) Safe use of social media
(ii) Identifying reliable websites for information and safe practices of information discovery
(iii) The law around revenge and child pornography
(g) Healthy lifestyles, including:
(i) Substance abuse
(ii) Self-harm
(ii) The dangers of self-harm and methods to cope with a desire to commit self-harm.
(iii) Information around common mineral or vitamin deficiencies
(iv) Ways to access healthcare
(v) NHS recommendations for keeping fit

(3) In Key Stage 4, schools must include information on the following:

(a) Anything in the KS3 content not yet covered, or including anything on the above that would be more age-appropriate for KS4 students
(b) Finances, including:
(i) Debit and Credit Cards
(ii) Effective budgeting
(iii) Loans and mortgages
(iv) Benefits and Pay
(v) Taxation
(c) Motoring law
(c) Motoring law and safe usage and navigation of Britain's public transport networks.
(d) Human Rights, including under the Human Rights Act 1998 and the UN Convention on Human Rights
(e) Tenant rights
(f) Trade Unions and Workers' rights

Section 6: Regulations

(1) Any regulations made under this Act shall be conducted in the negative procedure.

(2) The Secretary of State may, by order, insert or remove provisions for content to be taught in Section 5(2) or Section 5(3)

(3) The Secretary of State may, under the terms of Section 5 of the Exam Boards (Reorganisation) Act 2022 amend the contents and assessment procedures for the GCSEs created in Sections 3 and 4.

(4) The Secretary of State may, by order, amend the compulsory content in Section 4(3)

(5) The Secretary of State may, by order, amend the recommended content in Section 4(4).

Section 7: Short Title, Extent, and Commencement

(1) This Act may be cited as the Personal, Social, Religious, and Political Education Act 2023

(2) This Act extends to England

(3) This Act comes into force on August 1st 2024

This Act was written by the Rt. Hon. Sir Frost_Walker2017, Leader of the Opposition and Shadow Education Secretary, on behalf of the Labour Party.

Opening Speech:

Deputy Speaker,

I rise in support of this bill.

I was reviewing existing education related legislation and came upon several issues in the acts being repealed by this bill. The Sex Education Reform Act 2015, while an important building block for reform, is poorly written and requires reform due to reading more like prose than a piece of legislation. Further, it was too rigid in its instructions, and I would rather keep slack in place to ensure appropriate modifications can be made by schools to convey this important information.

The Key Stage 4 PSHE Act 2015 extended much of the provisions of the Sex Education Reform Act to KS4 and built upon it, but I still see flaws with it - namely that some of the PSHE content taught is genuinely better suited in other topics and that it ended the citizenship GCSE. The PSHE Modernisation Act 2018 ended religious studies at KS3 and overhauled the content taught in PSHE once again. While I generally don’t disagree with the content within the act, I must propose an alternative.

This bill essentially creates a new subject to be studied at KS3 and reforms two others. Religious Studies becomes a mandatory KS3 topic once again, but crucially is about broadening horizons and learning more about the world, and reforms the Theology GCSE into an optional Religious Studies GCSE. The written examination is a standard method of examination, with questions to be set by the English Exams Authority, while the group debate allows a chance for ideas to be explored in depth in true discussion.

Citizenship, or Civics, is restored as a subject, albeit with reduced time requirements per week. By involving students in learning about political processes, we can prevent issues of them leaving school feeling uninvolved in the UK’s democracy. Further, a new optional GCSE Politics is created for those students who wish to take it to explore such ideas further.

Finally, Personal and Social Education. This is, effectively, the bulk of PSHE content as many would currently recognise it. In KS3 and KS4, we see issues discussed of safe sex, online safety, and general health, while in KS4 the focus becomes on life skills to help students succeed in adulthood. The PSHE Modernisation Act’s transformation of PSHE into life skills is certainly desirable, but KS3 students are least likely to need to know about that, and so the focus is on the issues facing them such as puberty or mental health issues, while KS4 students are more likely to need those life skills.

Deputy Speaker, since 2014 we have made significant progress in education around these matters. I only wish to take it further.

I commend this bill to the house!

This division will end on Friday 24th February at 10pm GMT.