Christian and pro-family organisations have reacted with dismay to newly published draft government guidance on how schools should deal with trans-identifying school children.
An initial, stricter version of the guidance was produced under the Conservatives in 2023, which banned children from using different pronouns in the classroom.
However when Labour came to power in 2024, there is believed to have been considerable internal disagreement over how to proceed on the issue, leading to a significant delay in the final publication of the guidance by Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson.
The guidance says that primary schools should neither initiate nor encourage social transitions among school children. Nonetheless, children will be allowed to transition socially, meaning they can ask teachers and classmates to use their preferred pronouns.
Should a child request such a transition it should be treated “very carefully”, and parents are to be consulted and involved in the “vast majority” of cases, unless there is a genuine safeguarding risk to the child.
Clinical evidence should be sought and it has also been stipulated that biological sex will determine access to single-sex spaces like toilets and changing rooms with “no exceptions”.
Christian and family groups have reacted with concern to the guidance.
John Denning, Head of Education at The Christian Institute said: “It is profoundly harmful for a child to reject the reality of their God-given body and to try to live as if they are something they are not.
"Safeguarding guidance should ban schools from ever facilitating this: sadly, this draft guidance stops short, leaving some children at risk.
"Some schools have done terrible things: arranging counselling from activists for distressed young people behind parents’ backs; letting trans-identified teenage boys get changed for PE with the girls; putting pressure on pupils and teachers to affirm falsehoods.
"This draft guidance would stop much of that. But it needs to go further to protect children.”
The guidance is currently open to a 10-week consultation period, with Christian Concern saying that they will be responding.
On X, the group said, “Children will be allowed to socially transition. We cannot perpetuate the lie that boys can become girls and girls can become boys.”
The Family Education Trust described aspects of the guidance as “shameful”, saying, “The DfE guidance fails to protect vulnerable children who have been groomed by trans activist parents into believing they were ‘born in the wrong body’.
"This a safeguarding concern for the transitioned child AND other children unaware of their biological sex. Shameful!”
Unite for Education, a Scottish Christian charity, also wants the Westminster government to go further.
"The new draft guidance acknowledges that children will be allowed to socially transition, but we cannot perpetuate the belief that boys can become girls or girls can become boys," it said.
"That message, however well promoted, does not align with biological reality, and it risks causing deep and lasting harm to vulnerable young people who are looking for stability, identity, and truth."
It is calling on Scotland to follow England in adopting a more cautious approach.
"England is moving toward a more cautious, safeguarding first model. Scotland’s current guidance remains more permissive, often encouraging affirmation without question," it said.
"Families and campaigners are increasingly calling for consistency across the UK, especially where safeguarding and single‑sex spaces are concerned.
"With England now emphasising that social transition is not a neutral act, Scottish schools may face legal challenges if they continue operating under older, less cautious guidance."
Human rights organisation Sex Matters gave the guidance a more mixed review, welcoming the fact that there are now clear guidelines for schools to work with, rather than being left to work out the best approach themselves.
However, Sex Matters criticised the fact that social transitioning was still being permitted, and said that the guidance still promotes a “dangerous fairy tale that gives children unrealistic expectations that simply cannot be fulfilled”.
“The guidance gives non-negotiable red lines for every school and every child: schools must know, record and be able to refer to each child’s sex, and must not allow any child to use opposite-sex toilets, changing rooms or dormitories on school trips," it said.
“However, schools are still being left with the dangerous idea that they can facilitate ‘social transition’ – which remains undefined – and that they should negotiate this on a case-by-case basis.”
