Meeting of the Parliament 22 January 2025
The challenge of violence in our schools is very real. One of my frustrations with how the debate has developed over the past couple of years is that young people are almost always spoken about as either the victims or the perpetrators of that violence, and we rarely talk to young people as opposed to talking about them. We need to recognise that young people are absolutely key to the solutions. We heard from members of the Scottish Youth Parliament this morning that they want to talk about the core reasons behind the rise in violence in our schools.
The vast majority of pupils are well behaved the vast majority of the time: recent reports have confirmed that. All staff and pupils deserve to be safe at school. Our schools are certainly not all unsafe all the time, but there is a very real issue. Like most members, I know teachers who have been injured in the workplace throughout their career, but that has been happening far more frequently—and, in some cases, more severely—in the post-pandemic period.
Like the last time we debated this topic, the aspect that I want to focus on is violence against women and girls in schools. I raise the issue again because of my frustration at what I see as a lack of urgency in tackling it. The Zero Tolerance report from two years ago, “Gender inequality and violence against women and girls in Scottish schools” showed that one in five young women and girls felt unsafe at school in Scotland, and two in three had been sexually harassed.
In large part, that is because boys and young men just do not respect girls and women—and, in some cases, they hate them. I have said before that it is a matter that is to be dealt with through the personal and social education curriculum in our schools. I raise that issue because I have worked on it throughout the nine years that I have been a member of Parliament. We recognised the problem nine years ago, and in the period of time that it has taken us to get even this far—and we are nowhere near done with it—the issue has only got worse. The manosphere did not exist nine years ago, and Andrew Tate was not an influencer nine years ago.
I will address specific points on social media later, but I want to talk about the fact that, at the moment, the guidance for teaching sexual education in our schools makes one passing reference to the principle of consent—just one. That guidance is from 2014; it is not decades old. For three years, we have had a draft set of new guidance on how to deliver sex education in schools, which starts off with what our committee called for some years ago—a substantial section on the principle of consent and the importance of respect in relationships and respect for women and girls, in particular. It has been sitting as a draft for years now, and I am frustrated by the lack of progress.
However, I am pleased that, yesterday, I received an answer from the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills to a written question, saying that following the consultation that took place, we will finally get a finalised copy of that guidance in the coming weeks. That is important, because the new guidance starts with that substantial section on consent. It is also inclusive of LGBTQ young people, because we know that queer young people are disproportionately victims of violence in school. Age-and-stage-appropriate guidance for boys and young men on the importance of respect and healthy relationships is absolutely essential if we are to tackle the issue.
I want to talk about the issue again—I bring it up every time we debate the subject—because of my frustration about the fact that it has taken a decade to change just that one guidance document. In this Parliament, we talk a lot about tackling violence against women and girls, but can we seriously say that we are making progress and that we are proud of the progress that we have made when, in order to talk in any depth about the importance of a basic principle such as consent, it has taken a decade to change just one guidance document on one element of education?
This morning, members of the Scottish Youth Parliament confirmed that PSE in our schools is supposed to be co-designed by young people, specifically because of issues raised in relation to sex and relationships education, but that is simply not happening.
I am proud of the progress that we have made in certain areas; however, I am immensely frustrated that I am essentially making the same speech that I make in every one of these debates, because, for nine years now, we have failed to get to grips with what I see as one of the lowest-hanging fruits—one of the easiest areas in which we could make a difference.
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