n.b.

Dame Jill Knight, the leading proponent of the UK's Section 28 (Local Government Act 1988) is sporting more than a red face after being informed that the infamous Section does not affect teachers and governors as initially intended. Furthermore, local authorities are not prevented from offering their full range of services to lesbians and gay men.

This new interpretation of the law came to light with a circular issued by the Department of Environment on May 31st. The circular spells out that: "The responsibility for sex education continues to rest with school governing bodies by virtue of Section 18 of the Education (No 2) Act and Section 28 does not affect the accountability of school governors nor of teachers. It will not prevent the objective discussion of homosexuality in the classroom nor the counselling of pupils concerned about their sexuality".

London's Pink Paper quoted Dame Jill in angry mood: "This is clearly not what we intended for this amendment and I do feel that we have been misled. I find the circular unbelievable as it leaves the way open for some councils to exploit the apparent legal loopholes. We were told that the place for our legislation was the Local Government Bill and not the Education Bill, it would appear we have been sold a false prospectus as all I ever wanted to do was to protect children by stopping books like Jenny lives with Peter and Martin (sic) from being shown to children".

Local councils still cannot "intentionally promote" homosexuality although teachers and governors are free to do so and it remains to be seen if the Government will risk further embarrassment in amending Section 28. Some senior government ministers have already indicated a reluctance to introduce any further anti-gay legislation and indeed are not keen for there to be a prosecution under Section 28.