Government urged to repeal laws on compulsory collective worship in schools

Last Thursday (July 1st) the Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg MP launched a government website called ‘Your Freedom’, which invites members of the public to put forward and vote on unnecessary laws they wish to be repealed. Thousands of suggestions have already been submitted and one calling for the laws that require compulsory daily collective worship in maintained schools to be scrapped has quickly become one of the most popular.

In a further development Julian Huppert MP also yesterday tabled an Early Day Motion calling on the Government to repeal the laws that require collective worship in schools and to encourage them to instead provide inclusive assemblies.

Currently the law requires that the worship in faith schools in England and Wales be provided in accordance with the school’s trust deed or the tenets and practices of the religion or religious denomination of the school, while in all other maintained schools the worship is supposed to be wholly or mainly of a broadly Christian character.

The Chair of the Accord Coalition, Rabbi Dr Jonathan Romain, said ‘the laws requiring collective worship should be one of the first laws repealed by the Government. A school can do many things collectively, but by lacking a shared religious faith it cannot worship collectively. The current laws around collective worship are inflexible and fail to respect the beliefs of a great many children and their families in society. School assemblies should consider spiritual and moral issues and reinforce positive attitudes. However, this can be far better achieved through providing inclusive assemblies that focus on shared vales’.

‘Such a change would make it possible for more teachers to take assembly, while it would also ensure that a great many more schools acted within the law. OFSTED’s 2002-03 annual report stated that four fifths of schools do not hold a daily act of collective worship for all pupils. It is very unhealthy in a democracy for the law to be widely flouted and the law around compulsory worship in schools requires urgent attention.’

Notes

To support the proposal to end compulsory collective worship in schools on the ‘Your Freedom’ website click here.

The Accord Coalition was launched in September 2008 to bring together religious and non religious organisations campaigning for an end to religious discrimination in school staffing and admissions. Thecoalition also campaigns for a fair and balanced RE curriculum, for pupils to receive Personal, Social, Health and Economic (PSHE) education, the removal of the requirement for compulsory collective worship, but does not take a position for or against faith schools in principle. Its growing list of members and supporters include the British Humanist Association, the Christian think tank Ekklesia, the British Muslims for Secular Democracy, the Association of Teachers and Lecturers and members from all three of the largest parties in parliament.

For further comment, contact Rabbi Dr Jonathan Romain on 07770 722 893.

For further information, contact Paul Pettinger on 020 7462 4990.