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Scottish Parents Sue Over School Board Refusal to Allow Parental Opt-Out on Sex-Ed

Children who have opted out not becoming pregnant

GLASGOW, June 24, 2005 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A school board in a region that has the distinction of having the highest teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease rate in all of Western Europe is facing a lawsuit over a decree that would have banned parents from pulling their children from an explicit sex education program supposedly aimed at curbing the problem.

“The council’s lawyers have advised that opting out from sex education lessons should be treated no differently from seeking to opt out from any other part of the curriculum,” explained Gregory Carlin, spokesman for The Rights of the Scottish Child, a coalition of concerned parents and Catholics who oppose the council’s decision. “The controversial legal advice has been contradicted by other legal experts. The policy is also contrary to the position of the Scottish Executive.”

Carlin maintains that the STD and teen pregnancy problem actually stems from programmes like the Glasgow City Council’s graphic sex-ed curriculum for children. “The dreadful record of teenage pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases in Glasgow is largely because of the harmful sexualized environment created by educators and officials,” he said. “There is a sinister agenda in some health and education services to sexualise children, including getting the most graphic sex education materials into primary and even nursery schools.”

“The advice that Glasgow Council have been given will be tested in court and Glasgow City Council will be left to explain why they have once against gone to law only to lose in derisory fashion,” Carlin added. “Parents will fight to defend their children from what amounts to a form of sexual grooming and abuse. The protection of the courts will be sought to prevent the development of any programme of coercive sex education for Scotland.”

“This outrageous policy is focused on the children of parents who have pulled them out of the program, but those same children have not become pregnant,” Carlin said in a phone interview with LifeSiteNews.com Friday. “While Glasgow has the worst record for teen STD’s and pregnancies in northern and Western Europe, none of the Glasgow children of parents who pulled them out of the sex-ed became pregnant. Instead of re-thinking their problematic sex-ed program, these bureaucrats are attempting to ensure there are no examples left of the success which comes from avoiding the program.”

The likelihood of the policy remaining is low according to Carlin, who said that similar challenges in other areas have been successful. Add to that the dissension within the ranks of Scottish officials itself. Times On Line coverage of the measure highlighted that the Tory health spokesman in the Scottish parliament, Dr Nanette Milne, is opposed to the idea of forcing parents to keep their children in the classes.

See related LifeSiteNews.com coverage:
Scottish Schools Seek to Force Sex-Ed on Young Students, Parents to Be Barred from Opt-Out
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/jun/05062102.html

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