Serious concerns raised on government’s draft school and colleges guidance for gender questioning children
We’ve raised serious concerns through a consultation on the government’s draft ‘Guidance for Schools and Colleges: Gender Questioning Children’.
The national consultation, which closed on 12 March, asked for views on the content of the guidance and whether it will help support schools and colleges, teachers and leaders to make considered and lawful decisions in relation to children who are questioning their gender and the wider school and college community.
However, in a detailed submission to the consultation, the council’s response points out that the draft guidance risks contradicting its objectives.
The response outlines how the draft guidance fails in terms of human rights, equalities law and the Public Sector Equality Duty. In the council’s view, the draft guidance also deviates from the government’s Equalities Office guidance ‘Trans People in the UK’ published in 2018.
Critically, the guidance does not adhere to the principle that the welfare of the child and young person will be paramount in all considerations.
The criticism also picks up that assumptions in the guidance do not reflect the nuance of the approach needed to allow a school to properly respond to the unique needs of each situation.
Nor does the guidance offer any practical guidance for schools to act within the law, with a risk of putting schools and colleges in a position of potentially breaking the law through following government guidance.
Draft guidance lacking clarity, accuracy and humanity
Councillor Lucy Helliwell, co-chair of the council's Children, Families and Schools Committee, said: “As the council’s response to the consultation sets out, the draft guidance on gender questioning children raises serious concerns. It lacks clarity and accuracy on the law, which risks serious legal consequences for schools and colleges.
“Most concerning of all, it lacks humanity and understanding for the very real distress of children and young people who are either questioning their gender or can be properly termed as transgender.
“We fully support the NAHT’s stance about the importance of keeping in mind that it’s individual children and young people at the heart of all this, and that schools are focused on making sure every child in their care is both safe and treated with compassion and humanity.
“In contrast to this position, the draft guidance feels rooted in a position seeking to challenge the right of transgender children to be accepted, supported and welcomed into the school community.
“The lack of balance about the need to protect gender questioning pupils from prejudice is striking and unacceptable in any guidance to schools on this subject.
“The blanket approach of the guidance appears to be based on principles which are discriminatory, fail to understand the complexity of the needs of the children concerned, and fundamentally do not recognise their rights as transgender children, which is mischaracterised from the start as ‘gender identity ideology’.
“We’re asking for the guidance to be rewritten, taking into consideration the guidance and practice in Brighton & Hove City Council’s long-established Trans Inclusion Schools Toolkit, with a base line set of principles which recognise the need for a nuanced and individual approach to put the welfare of gender questioning and transgender pupils at the heart of the guidance.”