Beware bias against faith-based education

From: Coun Andrew Carter, Civic Hall, Leeds.

AS many people will know, Leeds Council is supposedly consulting on ways of reducing the cost of transport in children’s services. It currently costs over £16m a year.

Some of this is statutory, and some non-statutory, and I have no problem with the council looking at ways of reducing that bill. However, it is quite obvious to me that there is a bias against faith-based education, which is wholly wrong and undermines the whole consultation process.

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Indeed, parents who have spoken to me, and indeed the reaction from parents at a recent public meeting, suggests that the local education authority has a bias against faith-based education and is seeking to unfairly discriminate in terms of saving money. I am afraid to say, it is a view that I am increasingly coming to share.

In my view, there has long been a bias against faith-based education, in the LEA, then in Education Leeds and now in the LEA again, when in point of fact we should celebrate faith-based education and encourage it.

If readers think that I am perhaps exaggerating, I would advise them to look at Leeds City Council’s executive board report on the subject. It underlines very clearly why people suspect bias in the process. A diverse offering in education, giving parents and pupils the widest possible choice, is in my view essential to an improving educational system.

Bias is simply not acceptable or appropriate.