A New Petition

The government does not appear to have taken the thrust of the last petition seriously. (No surprise there then!) They wrote in response to the petition:

"The review of home education does not threaten a parent’s right to educate their child at home."

Well, no, but it does threaten to take away parental responsibility for the education and welfare of children, since the state looks as if it is about to dictate the standards that HE children must meet in these regards. It must therefore accept liability when these standards are not met.

However that petition did serve to raise awareness amongst plenty of otherwise less engaged HEors as well as some members of the wider population and therefore served a quite considerable purpose.

Hot on the heels of the review, we see some more petitions being created, the best of these being this one which needs your signature:

"We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to reject the Report to the Secretary of State on the Review of Elective Home Education in England by Graham Badman.

"This report is a totally disproportionate response to a 'perceived' problem full of unsubstantiated allegations that home educated children are more at risk than those at school. This is simply not true and enacting the recommendations in this report would establish the state as parent of first resort. To allow LA staff access to private homes to interview children without their parents when there is no reason to suspect abuse is outrageous."