Safe sex -- or healthy relationships?

Critics claimed that forcing every child to attend classes was a breach of parents' rights and would create more bureaucracy in schools. Yet many high-profile organisations, including sexual health charity Brook, are vowing to fight to give young people the right to high-quality SRE.

Good SRE is vital for young people and I would support the call to make it compulsory. However, the problem I've observed is that in schools, despite some exceptions, SRE is rarely of a high quality and often ignores important aspects of sex and sexuality.

I know one young man who is not yet in a sexual relationship. His class at school has talked about condoms and sexually transmitted infections during personal, social, health and economic education lessons, plus he has attended a sexual health drop-in at a local youth club. He knows how to have sex and what to do, so in many ways the education has been successful. Yet, while he may know how to take appropriate steps to avoid getting an infection, when he does start a sexual relationship, he has little idea about what constitutes a healthy and respectful relationship, or how to maintain one.