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Children, Schools and Families Bill

My Lords, I was also going to point out to the noble Baroness, Lady Perry, that while there are many excellent examples of PSHE teaching in schools, there are many schools in which it is not good. In answer to the point that the noble Lord, Lord Northbourne, made, the advantage of making it statutory is that teachers are trained better and we get a better standard teaching of this subject in schools. I must say how much I agree with the sentiments that have been expressed by the noble Baronesses, Lady Massey and Lady Gould, and the noble Lord, Lord Howarth. We are at the culmination of many, many years of campaigning to get PSHE on to the curriculum and taught properly in schools. We thought that we had got that with this Bill, but now we have lost it and it looks as though we may have lost it for another 20 years. This is really appalling. Those who rail against poor parenting should recognise that one is trying to get greater understanding of personal and family relationships and of what contributes positively to those relationships. We are very sad indeed that the Government have capitulated on an issue on which they themselves put such store when they introduced this Bill.