The definition of bullying: using superior strength to influence someone or force them to do something. It’s endemic at every level of society. But is the most effective way to deal with it for Nicky Morgan and Tristram Hunt to score points off of each other in a ‘I’m doing more than you to stamp out homophobic bullying’ pre-election competition: Nicky Morgan even claims to be on a moral mission?
The Labour Party published its Ending Transphobia Together document this week. It aims to eradicate homophobic bullying from ‘every classroom, dinner hall and playground’ It won’t, but it raises some questions. Firstly, the definition: bullying is personal, prolonged and persistent. Casual, throwaway use of derogatory words is thoughtless, it’s unpleasant and it needs to be dealt with, but it isn’t necessarily bullying.
Secondly, why the moral campaign against just one form of bullying? When did you last hear a politician talk about racial bullying? The anti-semitic bullying that necessitates guards on Jewish schools? The careless and widespread use of ‘spaz’ as a term of abuse? Or the malicious, targeting of SEND children in a ‘You’re a spaz. Why didn’t your mother abort you?’ type of comment. The Equality Act 2010 lists several protected characteristics. Focusing on just one group might win votes, but it tacitly minimises the seriousness of other forms of bullying and so denies equality of protection. Level the playing field, politicians, and comply with the Equality Act. Oh, and mention it to Ofsted while you’re about it. I’ve read a great many Ofsted reports since British values reared its head and Nicky Morgan went on her moral crusade. I haven’t read one comment on the bullying of any other protected group than LGBT.
Thirdly, dealing proactively with use of certain words will lessen the use of those words, but it does nothing to deal with the ignorance, prejudice, bigotry or malice that are the root of every kind of bullying. People will just find new words. Any effective anti-bullying policy needs to address the root that feeds the words and actions.
Finally, and most concerning, is the slipping in of a significant change to SRE policy under the guise of dealing with homophobic bullying. This is becoming a bit of a habit of Tristram Hunt’s – last autumn it was about manipulating the ethos of faith schools by changing admissions procedures whilst appearing to support faith education. This time, it’s about compulsory SRE in all schools ‘including faith schools’.
So faith schools will no longer be able to teach the sexual ethics which derive from their doctrinal views. There’s the real possibility that faith schools which don’t offer an SRE programme at all, because of a 100% parental opt out, will be compulsorily taken over. In doing so, their distinctive faith ethos will be destroyed.
But the deliberate use of the phrase ‘including faith schools’ indicates not only that Hunt knows this, but that he’s going to impose his agenda and is up for the fight against anyone, particularly people of faith, who wants to determine their own provision on ethical and moral issues. The Foreword makes that quite clear : ‘changing the law is a lot easier than changing hearts and minds. That process has to start with education’. Since when was it the job of a political party to use education to change hearts and minds to comply with its way of thinking? Just because you have an opinion, it doesn’t make you right.
We need to prepare our children and young people for life in modern Britain. We need to ensure the equal opportunity for each and every one of them to flourish as human beings . We need to create strong, caring families, within communities that contribute to a mature society. But we don’t do that by manipulating hearts and minds to conform to liberal secularist thinking. Diversity, not homogeny.
The definition of bullying: using superior strength to influence someone or force them to do something. Oh, wait, that’s exactly what politicians are promising to do. Using their superior strength to influence faith schools. Using Ofsted to force conformity with their agenda. That’s bullying. Under the 2010 Equalities Act it’s forbidden for protected characteristics, of which religious belief is one.
Unless, of course, you’re a Catholic, or a Muslim, or a Jewish or a Christian parent who doesn’t want to embrace a secular ideology. In which case, your religion is protected only until it informs your ethics, your morals and your worldview and so becomes inconvenient. No room for complacency – or no room for faith?
‘UK Closing Christian School for Religious Intolerance’ declaimed a headline this week – a single article by an American Christian online news provider. But while it started as a single article, comment spread rapidly, embroidered as it went with observations about the rampant bigotry and fascism of an education system (that’s ours, in case you no longer recognise it) which requires the teaching of ‘pagan’ and ‘heathen’ religions in the cause of multiculturalism. (As an aside, it was a classic example of remembering that when you point a finger, there are three more pointing right back at you).
What school was the article about? It turned out that ‘school’ and ‘closing’ were about the only accurate words in the headline, because the coverage was about Durham Free School. A journalist had latched onto the fact that DFS is a Christian ethos school (not a faith school) and, with no understanding of our school system,covered the coverage from other media. The conclusion: the sole reason the school is closing is because of persecution of Christians. Had said journalist taken the trouble to read the Ofsted report itself, he might have understood the complexity of the situation – and even that still wouldn’t have informed him as to why the Secretary of State decided to close the school. Nobody knows that apart from her and her advisers.
But covering the coverage didn’t stop there. Comment started appearing about the competence of the DFS staff, high numbers of whom had allegedly faced competency hearings in previous employment. But that sort of information is confidential, so how could it be reported as evidenced fact? Where had it come from? Well, it came from the local MP who used Parliamentary privilege to make the allegations. The trouble is, the coverage got covered as fact and while the Head has strenuously denied it and demanded an apology, the mud will stick. So as well as having to find other jobs within just a few weeks, the staff will have to go to interviews knowing that the interviewing Head might well be thinking, ‘Was it true?’ and ‘Is this one of them?’
The problem with covering the coverage is that it creates an echo chamber that gleefully resounds with no thought for the misery that it causes. Because beyond all the coverage, accusations about staff competence and Christian persecution are people: anxious students, distressed parents and worried teachers. For some students this will be their third secondary school in a short time. The closure of DFS comes against a backdrop of other school closures in Durham that have left parents angry as political and financial expediency impact on their children’s education. But it’s them who have to deal with the consequences of the decision. It’s them who will have to start again, building new friendships, becoming part of new communities and adapting to new contexts.
So, in a complex situation it would help if journalists, including Christian journalists, stopped just covering the coverage. Check source documents. Don’t just grab at one little bit of opinion, filter it through your own prejudice and then pass it off as evidenced fact in search of a dystopian headline and social media traction. Because the issues run deeper than one school closure and all that it entails. Ofsted is fast losing the respect of the workforce with which it should be working. It’s becoming increasingly political – maybe even entering identity politics. And while Sir Michael Wilshaw strenuously denied that there was an anti-Christian agenda in Ofsted, he followed it up with an equally strong assertion that Muslim schools are being treated exactly the same. So an anti-faith agenda, then, Sir Michael?
A time when liberal secularism is becoming the new normal, a time when faith in the public square is under attack, is a time to speak truth to power. That requires reason, a wide evidence base and patience. So don’t cover the coverage. It helps nobody.
As part of its anti-terrorism strategy, the government is currently consulting on Prevent, a document which outlines the intended duty of those working at every level of our education, health and prison services in preventing people from being drawn into terrorism.
We clearly need to address the issue of terrorism, why people espouse terrorist ideologies and why they act on that espousal. But is limiting the freedom of swathes of people the most effective way to promote a cohesive society built on strong communities? Is encouraging public sector workers to evaluate the ideologies of those children, young people and families that they serve the most effective way to nurture trust? Or will it create alienation, sectarianism and a bunker mentality in people who would like to go about their lives openly and peacefully, but who are forced into defensiveness through fear?
Don Horrocks, Head of Public Affairs at the Evangelical Alliance, has written in detail about the threat to freedom in our Universities, particularly with reference to the life of Christian groups on campus. Under the new mandate, all visiting speakers will have to allow sight of their presentation, including broadcast footage, at least 14 days before the visit (report sections 64-66). These rules will also apply to Further Education institutions (sections 88-90, 94-95).
The situation for schools, nurseries and child minders is a little different. The British values/SMSC/broad and balanced curriculum agenda that is already causing alarm forms a substantial part of the requirement (section 111). The document states that ‘schools should be safe spaces in which children and young people can understand and discuss sensitive topics including terrorism and the extremist ideas that are part of the terrorist ideology and learn how to challenge these ideas’ (section 106). But it will also require staff to intervene and report children at risk of being drawn into terrorism (section 113).
This raises some worrying issues. What effect will this have on the trust relationships that we build so carefully with our students and their families, if they feel they are being spied on? What climate will the fear that this engenders create in our classrooms? And how can sensitive topics be discussed in such a climate? The legislation will stifle the very open debate which it suggests that schools should facilitate.
But there are not only fundamental flaws in the content of this document, but in the thinking that informs it. There is an assumption that exposure to a dangerous idea creates a terrorist. But it clearly does not. Even exposure to extremist ideology in total does not, of itself, create terrorists. They are products of the much more complex set of cultural and personal views that inform their values: a government can neither legislate against hearts and minds nor win those hearts and minds for good through limiting the freedom of the rest of its society.
The consultation is open until midday on 30 January. However, the consultation process is itself flawed by bias. Questions assume agreement with the intended course of action and merely ask for more information to extend the reach of the strategy. In order to express any personal concern, you will need to contact your MP or write directly to the Home Office.
As we’ve seen with British values, poorly defined strategy allow for wide interpretation by monitoring authorities. Please respond to this consultation in order to protect not just the freedom of Christians, but also the essential freedoms on which our democracy is built.