Religious selection in schools challenged in parliament

Parliamentarians have spoken out against state schools which religiously discriminate against children in their admissions.

Baroness Lorely Burt today asked education minister Baroness Diana Barran if she agreed that "all children – irrespective of faith and belief background – should have equal right to access schools" funded by taxpayers' money.

Faith schools in England have exemptions from the Equality Act 2010, which enable them to prioritise children from families who share their faith if they are oversubscribed.

This can include requiring parents and children to regularly attend a local place of worship or provide evidence of baptism.

Many parents find that because they belong to no religion or a minority religion, they are unable to send their children to their local school.

Lorely Burt: "in agreement" with UN

Burt told peers that children of nonreligious families experience "double discrimination", because approximately 40% of all faith schools and 60% of Catholic schools give priority to children of families of any religion against those of no religion.

She said she is "in agreement" with the UN Commission on the Rights of the Child (CRC), which last month criticised the UK over discrimination in faith schools.

The CRC urged the UK to prevent "the use of religion as a selection criterion for school admissions in England" to "guarantee the right of all children to freedom of expression and to practise freely their religion or belief".

Other peers opposed to religious selection pointed out that only three other OECD countries – Ireland, Israel, and Estonia – allow state funded schools to practice faith selection.

They also highlighted that disadvantaged pupils are under-represented at faith schools, while those with high prior attainment are over-represented.

Baron Kenneth Baker said he did not know of any Church of England schools which practice faith selection Former archbishop of Canterbury, who became a temporal peer after retiring from the bishops' bench, also said the Church of England is "tolerant of other faiths".

But a quarter of Church of England state secondary schools prioritise children from different faiths over children from non-religious families. One in four dioceses surveyed advise local CofE schools to reserve some places on faith grounds.

Speaking on behalf of the government, Barran said the UK is a "proud signatory of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child", but the government "supports faith schools' ability to set faith-based oversubscription criteria."

NSS: Faith-based selection "goes against our basic values"

The National Secular Society, which has long campaigned for the equality law exemptions for faith schools to be repealed, briefed peers ahead of today's debate.

NSS head of campaigns Megan Manson said: "This debate should be a wake-up call to the injustice of inexcusable religious discrimination in our school system.

"Allowing state-funded schools to select children based on their family's religion goes against our basic values: equality, inclusion, fairness, and freedom of religion or belief.

"Our government must cease enabling religious institutions to foster this discrimination and segregation within our schools. It's time for faith-based school admissions to end."

This month the NSS also met with the Department for Education to echo the CRC's concerns.

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