New Petitions

PE2077, which was lodged by Thomas Ross, calls on the Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to remove personal and social education—often referred to as PSE—PSE from the curriculum for excellence and for it to stop being taught in secondary schools. The petitioner notes that, in their view, PSE is “a useless subject” that takes up secondary school pupils’ learning time.

The SPICe briefing notes that health and wellbeing is a key area of curriculum for excellence and that PSE is one of the ways in which schools support the health and wellbeing curriculum. The briefing also notes that PSE lessons can cover aspects of planning for choices and changes, substance misuse, relationships, sexual health and parenthood and financial literacy, as well as aspects of physical activity, sport and health.

In her response to the petition, the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills notes that

“PSE offers us an opportunity to ensure children and young people are prepared for the issues and challenges that life may bring”,

and makes the key point that

“The Scottish Government has no plans to remove PSE from the national curriculum.”

The cabinet secretary also highlights the Education and Skills Committee 2017 report, which noted

“how valuable good PSE is to young people”,

and says that the Scottish Government continues to take forward the recommendations of that report.

Do members have any comments or suggestions for action?

Thank you, Mr Torrance. I will make an additional suggestion. The cabinet secretary notes that the Education and Skills Committee’s 2017 report noted how valuable good PSE is to young people. Therein rests an issue of how contemporary the content of PSE is at any given point in time. From my constituents, I know that there is, at times, a feeling that the content has not been updated regularly enough to reflect current circumstances, and that the range of cultural and social issues affecting young people move apace, so what might have been relevant two or three years ago needs to be looked at again. Therefore, although the value of good PSE is there to be seen, students should not be questioning the value of the item in the curriculum, because they should feel that its content is relevant to their concerns and considerations. The content should not be speaking to something that is aged in relation to their personal experience.

Are members content that we proceed on that basis?

Members indicated agreement.

I say to Mr Ross that we are going to close the petition on the basis that the Government has no plans to do away with the subject. However, there is an issue at the heart of what he has said about the contemporary relevance of the subject at any given point, and we will draw that to the Government’s attention.