Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what targets the Government has set for tackling homophobia in schools; and what steps have been taken to achieve those targets in the last 12 months.

All schools are required, by law, to have a behaviour policy with measures to address all forms of bullying, including homophobic bullying. We trust schools and teachers to decide what measures they should use to address homophobia based on their particular circumstances.

Schools are held to account by Ofsted for their effectiveness in managing pupil behaviour and safety, which includes homophobic bullying. Inspectors must consider pupils’ freedom from all forms of harassment, bullying and discrimination. As part of the inspection, schools are asked to make available evidence of records and analysis of bullying, in particular homophobic bullying.

We have issued advice to schools on preventing and tackling bullying in which we link to national organisations such as Stonewall, who can provide specialist advice to schools. This advice is available online at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/preventing-and-tackling-bullying

In addition, we are working closely with the Government Equalities Office on a research project looking at effective ways of preventing and tackling homophobic, biphobic and transphobic bullying in schools. The results of the first phase of this work are expected to be published in autumn.

The Government has not set any national targets for tackling homophobia in schools as targets can lead to perverse incentives with schools doing the minimum required to fulfil the target rather than tackling the issue.