However, Charedi groups are still grappling with the implications of the Department for Education’s latest guidance on what schools should teach.
Education Secretary Damian Hinds, presenting the policy in parliament, was clear on Monday that by the end of their schooling, pupils should have covered LGBTQ issues.
“We trust teachers and headteachers to make the decision about when to do that,” he said, “but not whether to do it.”
According to the Charedi education group Chinuch UK, secondary schools will have the freedom to teach about LGBTQ issues as part of sex education rather than relationships education.
The distinction would be significant because parents retain the right to withdraw children from sex education until the age of 15 - and pupils themselves have that right after that age - but there is no right of withdrawal from relationships education.
Chinuch UK says, on the basis of briefings from DfE officials, that sex education could be provided by a third party outside the school.
