Member

The register will have downsides in terms of privacy and diversion of effort. It will intimidate some parents out of home education altogether, and it will begin to change the philosophy that guides home education. The current philosophy is that parents have the responsibility for their own children’s education. The requirement for local authority permission and the huge amount of information demanded by the state go in a different direction. They are starting to tell parents that the state knows best. That is why I personally am nervous about not just Clause 31 but many of these proposals: we are seeing the erosion of the vital principle that freedom and autonomy are fundamentally important and that the state does not have the right to go anywhere it wants at will. I am sure we will come back to all these issues, but, for the time being, I beg to move.