The British Government yesterday faced the threat of fresh battles over sex education in schools after Conservative peers and teachers' representatives criticised new sex education guidelines linked to repeal of Section 28 of the Local Government Act, the controversial legislation banning the promotion of homosexuality by local authorities.
The Education Secretary, Mr David Blunkett, insisted an amendment to the Learning and Skills Bill, which includes guidelines instructing teachers to tell pupils that "marriage and stable relationships" are the building blocks of society, promoted understanding rather than alienating children "from their mum or their parents".
The amendment was thrashed out between the government and church leaders after weeks of argument and a defeat in the Lords over government plans to scrap Section 28, in return for their support for amending legislation.
Some ministers, it is understood, have reservations about the guidelines, believing they could leave the government open to charges of hypocrisy similar to those which damaged the Conservative leader, Mr John Major, when he launched the "back to basics" campaign.
The amendment states that all children, from the final year of primary school onwards, should learn about the nature of marriage and its importance in raising children. Pupils must be taught to understand difference and about the importance of preventing or removing prejudice. Teachers will be banned from using "inappropriate teaching material", both homosexual and heterosexual, and the amendment will cover the use of homosexual material in schools which family values groups had campaigned against. Pupils will also be informed about the reasons for delaying sexual activity "and of the benefits to be gained from such delay".
But while most church leaders welcomed the amendment, Baroness Young, the former Conservative leader in the Lords who led opposition against repeal of Section 28, warned it did not go far enough. She said Mr Blunkett's amendment offered no protection and that Conservatives would vote against it. "It puts marriage on a par with a relationship between two transvestites or even two paedophiles," she said.
There was also criticism from the general secretary of the National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers (NASUWT), Mr Nigel de Gruchy.
He condemned the proposed guidelines as "insulting, patronising, superfluous and bureaucratic," and accused ministers "with all kinds of non-conventional lifestyles and broken marriages" of lecturing the nation on family values.