Education (Environment and Sustainable Citizenship) Bill [HL]
2.This Bill makes provision in the national curriculum regarding sustainable citizenship and protection of the environment.
3.Under clause 1(4) of the Bill, the Secretary of State must give guidance to maintained schools about the provision of sustainable citizenship education for all registered pupils who are provided with secondary education. The guidance must be given with a view to ensuring that the pupils learn about the impact of human behaviour on the natural environment, and the impact of the natural environment on human wellbeing, and that the pupils have opportunities to develop skills to protect and restore the natural environment, and skills to measure the impact of their actions on the natural environment. The governing body of a maintained secondary school must have regard to guidance under clause 1(4).
4.Although a duty to have regard to statutory guidance does not imply a duty to follow it in any or all respects, we have in recent years observed that a person or body required by statute to have regard to guidance will normally be expected to follow it and will in practice normally do so unless there are cogent reasons for not doing so. And yet this guidance is subject to no parliamentary scrutiny at all.
5.We consider that guidance should be subject to parliamentary scrutiny where a legal duty is placed on persons or bodies (in this case, school governing bodies) to have regard to the guidance and where the guidance is liable to have a significant impact on how statutory functions are exercised. Accordingly, the guidance under clause 1(4) should be subject to parliamentary scrutiny. We consider that the negative procedure would afford an adequate level of scrutiny.