More religion in state primary schools

Press, 28 March 1980, Page 13

More religion in state primary schools

Another hole which the Integration Act tore in the principle of secular education occurs in an unlikely place — the state primary school system. By some curious sleight-of-hand, the framers of the Integration Act also amended the Education Act itself by the addition of a clause giving the Minister the power to authorise as much further religious instruction in state primary schools as he sees fit, if he believes that a majority of parents desire it. Alarmed at this unex-

pected threat to the secular nature of state school education, the New Zealand Education Institute (the primary teachers’ “union”) has written to the Minister of Education asking that Section 78a of the Education Act, which allows him to authorise more religious instruction in schools, be amended to apply only to the integrated private schools. “His reply was noncommittal,” says Miss Helen Anderson, acting secretary of the N.Z.E.I. “He noted our reservations and indicated that he will bear them in mind

when the legislation is reviewed. There is no indcation of when that will be.” No-one seems to know why this curious change to the Education Act was made. There had been no request from parents or teachers for more religious instruction in schools. The initiative seems to have been taken by the working party which drafted the Integration Act, a group of 11 persons dominated by a six-man Catholic delegation.

Before that extra provision was made, schools

were bound by the “secular” clause — no religious instruction during school hours. The half-hour a week of religion which nearly all state primary schools have is reckoned to be extra time, and the school is theoretically "closed” whih. a local minister of religion or volunteer lay person takes religious lessons. It is within the power of school committees to decide whether religious lessons will be given at a particular school, and by whom.

In practice, according to Mr A. R. McLachlan, pres-

ident of the Canterbury School Committees Association, committees allow it as a matter of course, and approach the local ministers’ “fraternal” or willing volunteers to provide teachers. “There would have to be a very sound reason why a school did not have religious education,” Mr McLachlan says.

The National Council of Churches’ education commission has produced “graded scripture lessons” for use in schools during that half-hour a week, but there is no compulsion on the volunteer teachers to use it.

An alternative programme called “What Do You Think?" has been produced by the Council of Organisations for Moral Education (C.0.M.E.), which is comprised of S.P.U.C., Miss Patricia Bartlett’s Society for the Promotion of Community Standards, and the Family Rights Association, whose leading light is Mrs Joan Dunn, the originator of S.P.U.C. C.O.M.E. wanted its audio-visual programme used in state schools, but the Education Department’s review panel

turned it down. It. was considered unsuitable.

The programme was made with a Government grant of $19,633. C.O.M.E. claims that it was evaluated favourably by the Education Department, but the Minister of Education (Mr Wellington) has said that the authors of' the gramme evaluated reaction to it themselves in the south Auckland area.

Now C.O.M.E. approached the Minister to overturn the ruling of,the department’s review panel, and it is to go before the caucus education committee.