for the

Family

for the

Youth

for the

Future

Bulletin 132: Summer 2008

In this issue:

Arctic Conditions – towards a better way of taxing families

Simon Ling explains why the Inland Revenue is proposing to increase the tax burden on some married couples and suggests a better way forward.

The government is currently reviewing its options on ‘income shifting’. If that is a statement that produces an instant sense of incomprehension or stupefaction please put that aside and read on because it just may be of vital importance to the preservation of the natural family unit in society.

In recent years a legal case has been preoccupying the rarefied world of tax advisors and accountants. Last year it was settled by the House of Lords in favour of the taxpayers concerned – always a result that brings out the worst in Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (otherwise known as the Inland Revenue). In the pre-budget report last October they made some proposals which they hoped would ‘rectify’ the position (i.e. they wanted to change the rules to suit themselves) but these were so badly thought out that they were pulled to pieces by the responses to the discussion paper, and in the budget the Chancellor announced that the changes would be put on hold for another year.

The Arctic Systems case

So what has caused all this confusion and argument? The case concerned a married couple whom we can call Mr and Mrs Jones (because that was their name) and their business which was called Arctic Systems Limited. Mr Jones is an IT specialist, and Mrs Jones is his wife, mother to his children and general supporter in his office. They set up in business to provide consultancy services, which Mr Jones supplied to their customers. Mrs Jones kept the house and the books, answered the telephone and made sure the paperwork was done. They owned the business jointly (and equally); Mr Jones was the director and Mrs Jones the Company Secretary. They paid themselves a modest salary each and then split the profits equally by way of dividend.

So far so good, and you might be forgiven for not seeing where the problem lay. However this arrangement has the effect of minimising their joint tax bill. Had their business not been a company and instead Mr Jones had acted as a self-employed consultant so that all the income was in his name, their annual tax bill would have been considerably higher (possibly by as much as £8,500 or so at last year’s rates). Naturally this was what got up the collective nose of the Inland Revenue and they sought to set aside the sensible business arrangement that the Joneses had adopted using existing legislation – which is what failed them in the House of Lords.

But – and this is where we come in – why is it considered unacceptable for a married couple to be treated as a single unit for tax purposes?  After all, they make their vows to each other to share everything equally; they face life and its problems together; and, if so inclined, run a business together. Many countries (France, Germany and New Zealand, for example) recognise this situation and allow married couples to do just what our government is apparently seeking to make illegal; namely to split their joint income equally between them – or to put it another way, to be taxed on the joint income but with double the usual allowances. Some even put children into the equation so income is split three, four or more ways. In fact the government’s position is shown to be even more illogical by the fact that when it comes to income from savings and investments married couples are already actually encouraged to split it equally between them, because transfers of investments between husband and wife are permitted without being charged to capital gains tax.

Supporting income-splitting

Nobody pretends that such a measure on its own will be the salvation of married family life and reverse the trend of declining marriage rates and high divorce rates. However, shortage of money is one of the main contributors to marriage breakdown and any alleviation of this problem must go some way towards keeping marriages together. As such Family Education Trust should do, and is doing, its bit to promote it.

We need to make our voice heard soon, loudly and clearly. We are not really seeking to prevent any legislation designed to prevent couples in business from keeping up with the Joneses, but we do want to encourage government to introduce income-shifting (or income-splitting as it should preferably be known) arrangements for all married couples. The problem with this is it will prove expensive – potentially £9,000 per annum or so per married couple.  Furthermore it may prove politically difficult to exclude those in civil partnerships, although possibly less so to exclude cohabitees. A partial answer to the problem of cost is to seek to introduce income-splitting arrangements initially only for married couples and those in civil partnerships with dependent children (not many of the latter exist).

Many MPs are turned off by tax legislation because it appears boring and difficult to understand (perhaps you sympathise with that, but having read this far you may by now have seen its importance), and so tax bills probably do not get the scrutiny and criticism that they should. What we need to do is get as many MPs as possible on our side in this. Please consider writing to your own MP (or to any MP that you think might be sympathetic) and putting forward the case for income-splitting. If there isn’t enough material in this article for you to put together a one-page letter, get in touch with the office and we will let you have a template. Let’s get the cold hand of the Inland Revenue off the institution of marriage and persuade this government, or the next one, to reverse the anti-family trend in tax legislation and introduce income splitting as a married couple’s right.

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The retreat from reason

An extract from the Director’s report given by Norman Wells at this year’s annual conference.

Increasingly we are seeing intelligent people either denying the evidence that is staring them in the face, or else accepting the evidence, but refusing to act in line with it. Let me give you a few examples:

  • Last autumn Channel 4 broadcast a programme on abortion in the course of which Dr Kate Guthrie of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists said, ‘If we thought that we were carrying out procedures which caused pain and significant harm, we wouldn’t do them.’ Yet what can cause more significant harm than the taking of a life?
  • Or then there was the Minister for Public Health, Dawn Primarolo, who opposed any reduction in the legal limit for abortion on the basis that it would give false hope to parents of very premature babies. This is what she said: ‘There is a danger of giving hope to desperate parents, who are in difficult enough circumstances anyway, that may not be there for them.’ What absolute nonsense! Can you imagine any mother, rushed into hospital in labour at only 22 weeks, assuming that everything is going to be ok with her baby because the abortion limit has been brought down to 20 or 22 weeks? Of course not! Any mother in that situation is bound to be anxious. She’s going to want to know, ‘Is my baby going to be alright?’ And the doctor will tell her the truth: nothing is guaranteed, but the medical staff will do everything within their power to save the life of her child.
  • Or to change the subject, last autumn the Health and Education Ministers in Northern Ireland launched two ‘positive parenting’ booklets, Top Tips for Parents and Top Tips for Parenting Teenagers. Both booklets tell parents:

    ‘It is important to remember that you do not have a right to physically punish your child and you should, therefore, consider other methods such as positive parenting.’

    We took this up with the First Minister and received a letter signed by officials saying this:

    ‘The First Minister has been informed that the term ‘no right to smack’ as used in this publication refers to the fact that only reasonable chastisement of a child is permitted by law.’

    So, when the booklets tell parents they have ‘no right to smack’ it means they do have a right to smack, so long as they do it reasonably. In other words, the booklets mean the very opposite of what they actually say!

  • Or to take another example, earlier this year a church in Islington announced its refusal to conduct wedding services until permission was given to conduct same-sex civil partnerships. According to the minister of the church, the law forbidding churches to register same-sex partnerships amounted to ‘state-mandated discrimination’. He said, ‘We say “no” to bigotry, to homophobia and to discrimination against gay and lesbian couples.’

    I was invited to respond to the church’s position in a radio discussion and fully expected to be accused of the very things the minister had stated his opposition to. In the event, the discussion never got that far. Asked for my reaction, I said that:

    ‘For a church to say it won’t perform heterosexual marriages which have a proven track record until the government permits religious ceremonies for civil partnerships that have no proven track record shows a fundamental misunderstanding of equality and of what marriage is about.’

    Immediately, the presenter came back to me, ‘What do you mean, marriage has a proven track record?’ And so I spoke about the research showing the benefits of marriage for adults, for children and for society – health benefits, education benefits, lower rates of domestic violence, far less child abuse, and so on. Then the female presenter broke in: ‘Norman, I am sitting here with my mouth wide open. I cannot believe what I am hearing…’

    I found it quite striking that both presenters refused to accept that there were any benefits associated with marriage, and yet they were both strongly in favour of same-sex marriage. If marriage were really the disastrous institution they appeared to think it was, you would have thought that their attitude would have been that same-sex couples were better off out of it. But it was quite the opposite.

    It reminded me of an observation made by David Blankenhorn in his book, The Future of Marriage:

    ‘People who professionally dislike marriage almost always favour gay marriage.1

    ‘The most energetic crusaders against marriage in its customary forms appear to be among the most energetic crusaders for same-sex marriage.2

    If you’re wondering why that should be, Blankenhorn shows that it is the conscious aim of many anti-marriage activists to so broaden the definition of marriage that it loses its meaning and ceases to exist as an institution. He shows that same-sex marriage is being used as a means to an end, and the end in view is nothing less than the destruction of marriage as an institution.

Notes
1. Blankenhorn D, The Future of Marriage, Encounter Books, 2007, p.128.
2. ibid., p.171.

Norman Wells was recently elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (RSA) on the recommendation of the RSA Trustee Board for his research in the field of family studies.

 

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Annual General Meeting and Conference

Saturday 14 June 2008

In welcoming supporters to this year’s annual conference, the Chairman, Arthur Cornell, stressed the importance of confronting the government and the media with the realities experienced by the largely silent majority. In a target-laden culture in which economics seemed to set the priorities, he was reminded of some words of Robert Kennedy in 1968:

‘[T]he Gross National Product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education, or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages… [I]t measures everything, in short, except that which makes life worthwhile.’

Mr Cornell observed that the government was continuing to legislate to control outcomes rather than getting to the root of the problem. He detected a cry for help in the escapist behaviour that provoked severe abuse of alcohol, experimentation with drugs and the perceived need to carry a knife in a growing minority of young people.

Yet in stubbornly persisting with policies based on the premise that it was wrong to make judgments about different family structures, our political leaders were losing sight of what was in the best interests of children. It seemed stangely contradictory to call upon parents to take more responsibility for their children while passing laws suggesting that children do not have the right to a father.

The Hon Treasurer, Simon Ling, presented the accounts for approval. He reported that there had been an increase in donations during 2007, though the total income remained at a similar level to 2006 when a legacy had been received. Mr Ling encouraged supporters to consider leaving a legacy to the Trust if they had not already done so. Interest and investment income showed an increase as a result of a policy decision to invest for income rather than capital growth in line with the Trust’s long-term objective to fund its core expenditure out of endowment.

In the Director’s report, Norman Wells referred to the consultations and inquiries the Trust had contributed to and the wide range of topics it had researched and commented on in the press and media. He highlighted four activities in particular: (a) the promotion of the Why Save Sex? leaflet; (b) the publication of the report, Waking Up to the Morning-After Pill; (c) the Section 58 Review, more commonly known as the government’s review of the law on smacking; and (d) the Human Fertilisation and Embryology (HFE) Bill.

In connection with the HFE Bill, the Trust had written to MPs in advance of the House of Commons debate on 20 May urging them to support Iain Duncan Smith’s amendment calling for consideration to be given to the need of a child for both a father and a mother. With the letters it had enclosed a briefing which highlighted the adverse consequences of fatherlessness for children, for mothers and for society. A number of MPs had written to express appreciation for the briefing and several had given powerful speeches on the importance of fathers in the House of Commons debate, but Mr Duncan Smith’s amendment had been defeated by 292 votes to 217.

On the day of the debate, Mr Wells had been asked by the Scotsman newspaper to contribute to a debate feature in support of the proposition that ‘children usually grow up best in a home with a mother and a father’. His opponent had been the director of public affairs at Stonewall who had no evidence to offer in support of his position in relation to the welfare of the child and whose argument in favour of fatherless families rested on the ideological premise that, ‘gay and lesbian couples deserve the same rights as everyone else’.

British Humanist Association president and Guardian columnist, Polly Toynbee, summed up the debates on the HFE Bill as a matter of ‘medievalism versus progress’. In her view, legislating for abortion on demand and yet more fatherless families represented progress, regardless of the evidence. Harriet Harman, the Leader of the House of Commons and Minister for Women and Equalities had also shown scant regard for the evidence on the welfare of children. In an interview for the Civitas title, Second Thoughts on the Family, she conceded that longitudinal social research showed that having a father and a mother produced the best outcomes for children, and yet she still insisted that there was no ‘ideal’ parenting scenario, and she had no intention of doing anything to encourage stable two-parent homes.   In her view, the important thing for the government was to ‘respect choices’ – any choice. She even went so far as to see higher rates of separation as a positive development, reflecting ‘greater choice’ for couples.

Mr Wells commented that in their passion for the so-called ‘rights’ and ‘choices’ of adults – and particularly the ‘rights’ and ‘choices’ of women – figures such as Polly Toynbee and Harriet Harman had become insensitive to the needs of children. (See extract from the Director’s report.)

Tributes to Denis Riches

Both the Chairman and Director paid tribute to the late Denis Riches who had served as a trustee and Company Secretary prior to his death in December 2007. Mr Cornell commented on his special role in the development of the Trust’s work and spoke of his great sense of humour and infectious love of life, complemented by the gracious manner of a gentleman. He had unceasingly supported Mrs Riches in her role with his quiet, thoughtful and encouraging contributions. The Trust was indebted to him for his wisdom and generosity.

Mr Wells described Mr Riches as ‘a true gentleman: kind, thoughtful and considerate’, and referred to the immense amount of support and practical help he had given to the Trust in matters large and small for well over 30 years. During 2007, Mr and Mrs Riches had celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary and published Built on Love: An autobiography for two, which formed a fitting tribute to a marriage that embodied everything the Trust stood for.

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Local Reports

The local reports session is always an eagerly awaited part of our annual meeting and this year was no exception as friends old and new took the opportunity to share something of the work and campaigns in which they have been engaged during the past year.

Ann Allen and John O’Reilly were unable to be with us in person, but submitted written reports from Scotland and Ireland respectively. In addition to the summaries shown below, our Hon Treasurer, Simon Ling, drew to our attention the government’s plans on income-splitting and urged us to take appropriate action (see article above). As ever, it was an informative and challenging session and highlighted a wide range of concerns.

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Northern Ireland

Mary Russell began her report by referring to the wails of protest from some sections of the child-rearing industry following the government’s decision not to legislate against the reasonable chastisement of children. She had written a letter which was published in the main Northern Ireland newspapers, and taken part in a debate on Radio Ulster. She made the observation that parents love their children in a way that paid professionals could never do, and that in the ordinary day-to-day business of raising a family, the children’s rights campaigner is no more expert than the mother at home.

A growing perception that parents are no longer capable of guiding and caring for their young seemed to be driving various government bodies to embrace costly programmes aimed at either stating the blindingly obvious or engineering a shift in parental attitudes to accommodate a politically correct world. She cited a local radio show in which the Northern Ireland Children’s Commissioner had outlined plans to introduce a scheme to eradicate bullying, including measures targeting the pre-school child. The project involved puppet shows, training nursery staff, special monitoring, and engaging a myriad of outside agencies. Mrs Russell had stated on air that it was unbelievable that an entire government programme could be devoted to something as basic as encouraging good behaviour in toddlers and four-year–olds. She had wondered what had happened to the tried and tested ‘Don’t do that!’ method of child-rearing – which would certainly be cheaper and probably more effective than a puppet show.

More recently, the children’s commissioner had bewailed the lack of sexual health clinics in rural areas and the lack of sexual health information to the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender community, and had called for more sex education in schools. She had also committed herself to press for a change in the law so that young people engaging in consensual sexual acts as part of their natural development should be free to access advice and support without being referred for child protection assessment.

On a brighter note, Mrs Russell reported that the four main political parties in the Northern Ireland Assembly had given overwhelming support to a motion rejecting any move to extend the 1967 Abortion Act to the Province, and an all-party pro-life group had been formed to counteract the advances of the pro-abortion lobby.

In conclusion, Mrs Russell stated that whenever she spoke out in public, people would tell her how glad they were that there is an alternative voice to the liberal, politically correct view so prevalent in the media. She expressed gratitude to the Trust for the Family Bulletin which she found a valuable mine of information and comment.

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Cornwall

Margaret Harris highlighted a range of issues which had been occupying the attention of Cornwall’s Community Standards Association. She referred to the failure of the government’s teenage pregnancy strategy and of sex education in schools and expressed concern about the secrecy of the family courts.

The number of quangos was growing at an alarming rate and their influence was frequently not serving the best interests of children and young people. Mrs Harris singled out the children’s commissioners for particular criticism and expressed concern about the intrusive nature of some of the questions contained in an Ofsted questionnaire which asked pupils to give details of their home life.

Other issues addressed by the Association included same-sex adoption, the inclusion of white and black magic in RE lessons, and the novels of Philip Pullman.

Following Mrs Harris’s report, the Chairman recalled a conversation in which an educational psychologist had reflected on the significant cultural changes that had occurred over the past three decades. The psychologist had remarked that at the beginning of his career, as children walked down the corridor of life they passed doors marked ‘Sex’, ‘Alcohol’, ‘Drugs’ and ‘Violence’; but whereas those doors used to be firmly locked and only a few managed to force their way in, now those same doors were wide open.

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Derbyshire

Eunice Johns spoke about the difficulties she and her husband had encountered over their application to foster children under the age of 10. They had previous unblemished experience of fostering and had been given good references. As part of their assessment they had been asked what they would do if a child came home from school and told them he had been bullied because he was ‘gay’. In reply Mr and Mrs Johns had stressed that they would love the child unconditionally and provide him with security, love and a safe environment. However, this was deemed an inadequate response. The local authority stressed that foster carers must be prepared to tell the child that there is nothing wrong with homosexuality. When Mr and Mrs Johns had explained that, as Christians, they could not condone homosexuality, they were advised they did not meet the criteria.

After referral to a senior officer, Mr and Mrs Johns were told that in order to be approved as foster carers they must appreciate that homosexuality is a way of life – even though they were seeking approval to foster children below the age of 10. When they declined the Council’s request to withdraw their application, they received a letter thanking them for withdrawing their application.

Following further discussions, Derby City Council had agreed to continue the assessment. Mr and Mrs Johns were very keen to foster, but were not prepared to compromise their faith.

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Oxfordshire

Eileen Wojciechowska expressed concern about the sexual images and messages that were being given out in local shops. She referred to ‘lads mags’ being displayed at waist height in local newsagents, and an advertisement broadcast over a loudspeaker in a local chemist in which a baby’s cries were followed by the message, ‘Don’t spoil your fun. Don’t forget to pack your condoms’.

Such images and messages had become so widespread that people had become desensitised to them. On a visit to her local Co-op, Mrs Wojciechoska had queried with a supervisor whether he thought it appropriate to display ‘lads mags’ next to children’s books and puzzles. It was only when she threatened to fetch a newspaper reporter that he agreed to take any action.

Mrs Wojciechowska had been encouraged to hear that a talk she had given several years previously had sown a seed that had resulted in someone becoming a LIFE counsellor, and that a local school which had previously been resistant had recently accepted a pro-life presentation. She encouraged supporters to be persistent in their own local areas and to sit down with people and encourage them to think things through.

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Ireland

In his written report, John O’Reilly recounted the involvement of Family and Youth Concern supporters in a campaign against the anti-family stance of the government in the run-up to the Irish General Election in May 2007. Their efforts were rewarded on the eve of the election when the government and the main opposition party gave satisfactory guarantees on questions relating to abortion and experimentation on human embryos. However, Mary Harney remained Minister for Health and Children and was likely to continue pursuing a liberal social agenda.

The European Parliament and the Council of Europe continued to put pressure on the government over the lack of abortion facilities in Ireland. Mr O’Reilly noted that such international bodies were becoming more oppressive in character and considered that their passion to promote abortion and homosexuality was surprising in view of Europe’s demographic decline.

In addition to the production of the quarterly Response magazine, the main areas of current concern for the Irish Branch were to:

  • prepare the ground for another referendum on abortion longterm;
  • reform the publicly-funded Crisis Pregnancy Agency so that it works at reducing abortions instead of being a de facto abortion promoter;
  • scrap the government’s Commission on Assisted Human Reproduction report which is totally anti-life;
  • seek legislation to protect human embryos in IVF procedures, as is the case in Italy and Germany;
  • resist the enactment of same-sex partnerships.

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Scotland

In a written report, Ann Allen referred to the evaluation of the National Sexual Health strategy being undertaken by the Scottish government. The government had signalled its desire to address the cultural issues that lay behind the alarming statistics of juvenile crime, sexual activity, and drug and alcohol abuse. The Scottish Archbishop had given a fearless critique of declining standards of morality, but there remained a danger that the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual asnd Transgender (LGBT) agenda would be forced upon schools.

The Scottish government was considering the decriminalisation of consensual sex between 14 and 15 year-olds. This could send out the signal to young people that underage sex was approved of. Although the government had so far resisted the inclusion of abstinence in Sex and Relationship Education classes, voluntary groups giving presentations on saving sex were being welcomed by staff and pupils in many schools.

Mrs Allen made reference to a report prepared by the LGBT Hearts and Minds Agenda Group at a special ministerial reception held at Edinburgh Castle in February. The report called for a duty to be placed on all public bodies to promote LGBT equality and recommended the promotion of ‘diversity champions’ and workplace equality. It also demanded the development of guidance on the inclusion of LGBT issues in the school curriculum and a government-led initiative to combat homophobia in schools.

Margo Macdonald, a prominent Member of the Scottish Parliament who was herself suffering with a life-limiting illness, was campaigning for the legalisation   of   assisted   suicide. The umbrella organisation, Care Not Killing, was opposing such a law.

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Alive to the World

Louise Kirk spoke about a resource for use with children aged 6-18 in PSHE and Citizenship classes that had been developed by Christine Vollmer. The series of books entitled ‘Alive to the World’ was currently available in Spanish, but was shortly to be published in English by Gracewing.

Mrs Kirk expressed concern that where schools were teaching abstinence, it was frequently given too late and not enough time was devoted to it. ‘Alive to the World’ set out to lay the foundations at an earlier age and took care to involve parents at every point. Mrs Kirk also commended the work of Family Choices which had published a series of leaflets on family issues and was developing a helpful website.

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Challenge Team UK

Sue Relf reported that since February 2004, the Challenge Team UK had trained 27 volunteers to give presentations in schools and youth clubs on the benefits of saving sex for marriage. For nine weeks in the autumn term, a team was touring the north of England, Scotland and the West Country, while in the spring term, the team spent nine weeks touring the Midlands and the South East and South Central parts of England.

Between September 2007 and March 2008, the team had reached 17,500 teenagers in 90 schools and aimed to reach 20,000 young people in 100 schools in 2008/09. Since the first UK team was established in 2004, 60,500 pupils had been reached.

From September 2009, Mrs Relf hoped that two teams would be in operation – one to spend two terms working in the north, and the other working for two terms in the south. The team charged schools £150 for a visit and had also secured a three-year grant to employ two part-time administrators and another member of staff to recruit and train presenters. Feedback from schools was consistently good, and 95 per cent of schools invited the team to return. Mrs Relf was anxious to find ways of following up visits to schools and evaluating their effectiveness.

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Education and culture

Irina Tyk began her address by asserting that no one had reason to value family life more than the head of a school. One thing she had learned in the 20 years she had spent as head of Holland House School was not to underestimate the family.

One of the most striking features in modern society was the absence of a set of moral principles to which the overwhelming majority subscribes. Children no longer had a sense of right and wrong, and there was a lack of embarrassment, shame and conscience in the young and their parents. Self-interest and self-promotion had become the dominant concerns of many. People no longer viewed behaviours as wrong simply because they were wrong, but because they were not profitable, practical, or of visible benefit.

The lack of consensus about any set of moral principles was having an adverse impact on education. There is all the difference in the world between teaching an honest mind rather than a dishonest mind; and between teaching a student who is familiar with the language of good and evil rather than one who is dismissive of such distinctions.

No shared moral assumptions

The emphasis on children learning to live without making judgments and the promotion of cultural relativism was turning the classroom into a judgment-free space. There were no shared moral assumptions in the modern classroom. Feeling was taking precedence over thoughtfulness.  Ofsted inspectors were frequently more concerned with knife crime and with drug and sexual abuse than they were with the quality of children’s minds. Many teaching hours were lost because of the legal requirement for staff to attend courses that have nothing to do with how best to teach children and everything to do with society’s impression that the vast majority of children are in danger of psychological or physical abuse.

It was a huge mistake to believe that young children were too young to possess a moral dimension and to be morally accountable. Mrs Tyk spoke of a ‘communism of the human mind’ which was denying children moral individuality, whereas in reality, as soon as a child learns to act freely, he becomes a moral agent and must learn that each of his actions may be right or wrong.

The anti-intellectual climate in which schools operate had become such that happiness and intellectual development were commonly thought to be mutually exclusive. Yet children experienced more stress in the lowest-achieving schools than higher-achieving ones.

The language of ideas

Children frequently claimed to be bored due to the failure of parents and teachers to imbue them with the language of ideas. Parents were increasingly inclined to follow their children rather than lead them, with the consequence that the ugliness and vulgarity of language was repeated in homes throughout the land. Parents must take responsibility for teaching their children the language of ideas by:

  • family discussions around the dinner table;
  • encouraging them to disagree courteously and constructively;
  • teaching them to contemplate – to read and spend time alone;
  • helping them to see that understanding things involves far more than merely knowing their names;
  • employing the languages of science, art and morality so that they can appreciate their own humanity and that of others;
  • promoting the development of the imagination by teaching them to think of the world as it should be rather than as it is.

It was very difficult to teach children how to think and develop their rational faculties in a culture that was overtly irrational, anti-intellectual and amoral.

Young people no longer had heroes to admire and be inspired by; everything had been reduced to the average. The collectivisation of thought and feeling was a major factor in the lack of self-confidence of so many young people. In order to imbue children with self-confidence, they must learn to think alone, spend time alone and achieve alone. A good education developed a capacity for solitude. The inability to stay in a room alone accounted for much of the restlessness and anti-social behaviour of the younger generation.

The simplicity of teaching

Modern technology had not done us any favours by creating a ‘virtual’ community with ‘virtual’ friends, so that physical solitude did not invite the intellectual solitude that enables the mind to function at its most productive. The government was investing in the wrong ideologies when what was really needed was a return to traditional teaching methods.

Teaching ought to be a very simple process: the means by which the one who knows more teaches the one or the many who know less. But the process by which teachers are now accredited had become far removed from the simple passing of knowledge from one to another.

‘The present-day teacher is a social worker, even when none is needed; he is a parent who cannot ever do for a child what a parent must do; he is a policeman who is required to carry out checks and procedures to ensure that no crime or abuse is committed in the home. In short, the modern-day teacher has to do everything but impart an objective body of knowledge and teach children how to think rationally and logically.’

Taking time to teach

In a culture that eschews ideas in favour of slogans and mantras, parents and teachers must take time to imbue children with thoughtfulness and care for others, and prepare their minds for the complexities of life. In order to avoid the oversimplifications and mediocrity that assail our children, it is necessary to:

  • teach them about right and wrong, by example and instruction;
  • teach them to speak in their own voice, not in crowdspeak;
  • teach them that education is not just a means to a job with a higher income;
  • teach them to appreciate beauty and the aesthetic dimension;
  • teach them to participate and to be alone;
  • teach them not to make judgments based on outward appearances; and
  • teach them to be courteous dissidents.

Irina Tyk is headmistress of Holland House School in Edgware. She is the author of The Butterfly Book, a basic reading and writing course using synthetic phonics (see review in Family Bulletin 131). Copies are available from Family and Youth Concern priced at £7.50 + £1.00 p&p.

 

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Rites of passage in a modern age

Ray Lewis spoke with passion and enthusiasm about his work at the Eastside Young Leaders Academy (EYLA). The Academy aims to provide a programme of education for young black males, aged between 8 and 18. In many cases the headteachers at the schools they attended had washed their hands of them and they were deemed at risk of social exclusion, but the Academy staff had ‘made progress with the boys and despite the boys’ in after-school and weekend activities.

Mr Lewis stressed that the EYLA programme was gender-specific. It was a foundational principle that men and women are different by design, that our traditions mean something, and that we forsake them to our detriment.

In our modern culture, we faced a number of challenges: the growing use of technology meant that parents were now less intimate with their children, and people felt intimidated by a state that was increasingly dictating what we can say and how we can say it. There was an absence of any real philosophical, spiritual and moral backbone.

Fathers as navigators

Fatherhood was being undermined, but there was no doubt that fathers were of immense importance. Mr Lewis recalled a discussion about fatherhood he had initiated with 15 boys, most of whom did not have a father at home. They readily recognised that fathers were important. Children need a father to show them how to navigate the way from boyhood to manhood.

When people substitute truth for a lie anything is possible. There was a pressing need for parents to make sure their own houses were in order and their own children properly supported. It may be an uphill struggle against the tide, but revolutions often begin with a minority.

Citing the enthusiasm of the Youth Justice Board to discuss its new plans and its resistance to reviewing the failure of its previous plans at considerable public cost, Mr Lewis observed that when an organisation no longer knows what it is doing, it does anything because it wants to be seen to be doing something. Politicians similarly lacked clear direction because inherent in the post was the need to satisfy everyone.

The invention of the ‘teenager’

Mr Lewis lamented the decline of family meals. All too often people met, but did not engage. He described the invention of the ‘teenager’ – with the accompanying pop music and fashion – as the biggest lie of all. Unscrupulous people had encouraged the development of a rebellious spirit and we havd reaped the consequences. In his native Guyana, there were young adults, but no teenagers. There, sons longed to grow up to be like their fathers; whereas here, children want to be anything but like their parents.

Unless the hearts of fathers are turned towards their sons, adolescents will initiate themselves and they will be left without any moorings. There is an urgent need to rebuild civil society, beginning with the family.

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The Family Life Award

The Family Life Award for 2008 was presented to Christine Hudson for her determination, courage and perseverance in support of the family and the welfare of children and young people.

For many years, Christine has written letters to local and national newspapers, submitted online responses to articles and participated in radio discussions on a whole host of issues. She has written and spoken on marriage, motherhood, parental responsibility, sex education, teenage pregnancy, abortion, euthanasia and embryo research, to name but a few.

Fired by her concern about the new morality being imposed on children at schools and the way in which parents have gone from being the primary educators of their children to being totally sidelined within a relatively short space of time, Christine has engaged in correspondence with government ministers and officials. When her concerns have been brushed aside, she has persevered and pressed for an honest answer long after many would have given up.

With the full support of her husband Nigel, she has held meetings with the headteacher and chair of governors at her local secondary school in an attempt to ensure that parents are properly consulted about the introduction of confidential health clinics and changes to the sex education policy, and that their views are treated with proper respect.

Christine is no lone warrior. In February 2005, she organised a public meeting on the subject, ‘Your parental responsibilities – are they being challenged?’ This led to the formation of a small local campaigning group. Under Christine’s guidance, Parents Nework Plymouth has undertaken mailings to primary and secondary schools to promote the use of material that upholds a proper respect for marriage and stable family life. By means of telephone calls, emails, letters, and by her sheer example, she is also a source of encouragement and inspiration to others engaged in similar battles in other parts of the country.

As secretary of the Plymouth branch of the Society for the Protection of the Unborn Child, Christine often has opportunities to speak to children in schools on pro-life and family issues, but she has never lost sight of her primary commitment to her own seven children and four grandchildren. She is also always on hand to provide practical help to her parents.

The good humour and humility that characterises everything Christine does has been well expressed by one admirer when she writes: ‘Christine is a very positive person and this radiates throughout her work even though she rarely thinks she has done a good job.’ Though she may not always think it herself, others have noted the good job she is doing and we were pleased to recognise that by presenting this year’s Family Life Award to Christine Hudson.

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Government agency has no answer to high STI rates

According to the latest figures from the Health Protection Agency (HPA), sexually transmitted infection (STI) rates have continued to rise alarmingly among young people. While just one in eight of the population are aged 16 to 24 years old, this age group accounts for around half of all newly diagnosed STIs in the UK – 65 per cent of all chlamydia (79,557 of 121,986), 55 per cent of all genital warts (49,250 of 89,838) and 50 per cent of gonorrhoea (9,410 of 18,710) infections diagnosed in GUM clinics last year.

In response to the figures, the HPA recommends that ‘all sexually active young people are screened for chlamydia annually and every time they change their sexual partner’, and that ‘all gay men should take an HIV test annually and each time they believe themselves to have been at risk of infection’.

Apart from using a condom, the only additional advice offered by the HPA is the lame statement that: ‘People can reduce their risk of catching an STI by having fewer sexual partners and avoiding overlapping sexual relationships.’ There is no reference to the fact that people can eliminate the risk of infection by confining sexual intimacy to the context of a lifelong, mutually faithful marriage.

HPA, Sexually Transmitted Infections in Young People in the United Kingdom: 2008 Report.

 

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Social engineering in schools

Writing in the Daily Telegraph, Rod MacKinnon, headteacher of Bexley Grammar School argued that, contrary to the expectations of some people in positions of influence, schools were not in a position to solve all of society’s ills. Teachers simply did not have the contact time to ‘create’ behaviours and attitudes within children: ‘they are not (and can not be) social engineers and social workers and surrogate parents as well as subject teachers all rolled into one’.

Noting the aspirations of some in education to use children and schools as social engineers with a view to creating a different society, he stressed: ‘[W]e should not even be trying to do such things; children need to be nurtured, educated and cared for, not thrown into the front line of social reform.1

Mr MacKinnon’s comments were made following the publication of draft guidance for consultation on the role of schools in promoting pupil well-being.2

Notes:
1. Daily Telegraph, 4 July 2008
2. http://www.dcsf.gov.uk/consultations/

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Abortion rates continue to rise among the young

The under-18 abortion rate rose by 8.8 per cent from 18.2 per 1,000 in 2006 to 19.8 in 2007, while the under-16 abortion rate rose by almost 13 per cent from 3.9 per 1,000 to 4.4. The figures released by the Department of Health showed that the abortion rate was at its highest for women aged 19, at 36 per 1,000.1

According to data obtained by the Sunday Times under the Freedom of Information Act, each year 10-15 girls aged as young as 12 are having an abortion. The government had initially refused to disclose the figures by claiming patient confidentiality, but the newspaper successfully appealed against the decision and the information commissioner ordered the statistics to be disclosed.

The figures, which the Department of Health withheld for three years, show that in 2003 10 girls aged 12 had abortions. This increased to 15 in 2004. The figures also showed that 138 girls aged 13 had abortions in 2003, which increased to 142 in 2004.

Ann Furedi, the chief executive of the abortion provider, the British Pregnancy Advisory Service, commented: ‘Children grow up very quickly in our society. They are maturing faster physically, psychologically and socially, and society just has to come to terms with that. Both parents and teachers need to be able to provide them with the sex education information they need.’2

Notes
1.  Department of Health, Abortion Statistics, England & Wales: 2007, 19 June 2008.
2.  Sunday Times, 27 April 2008.

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Sex and Relationship Education review

The government has announced that the final meeting of the Sex and Relationship Education review group, originally scheduled for July, has been postponed until the middle of September. This allows more time for parents, teachers and others to register their concerns. For more information about the review, see Family Bulletin 131 and the press notice issued by the Department for Children, Schools and Families in February at: http://www.dfes.gov.uk/pns/DisplayPN.cgi?pn_id=2008_0029

 

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New trustee – Dr Joseph Lim

Following his election at our AGM on 14 June, we are delighted to welcome Dr Joseph Lim as a trustee. Dr Lim is a pharmacist by training and is employed as a pharmaceutical assessor with the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).

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