The Rationalist Society of Australia is seeking clarity from the Victorian Liberal Party on whether it is planning to return religious indoctrination to class time in public schools if it wins the state election next year.

RSA Executive Director Si Gladman has written to new Opposition Leader Jess Wilson (pictured) this week, having not received a reply to his previous letter to her earlier this year when she was the Liberal Party’s education spokesperson.

In August, the RSA told Ms Wilson that the party should be clear on its policy given that, at a previous election, it pledged to return the deeply unpopular Special Religious Instruction (SRI) program to class time.

Also, Mr Gladman noted that the RSA was concerned when a Liberal member of parliament last year called for the Victorian government to directly fund the missionary activities of SRI provider Korus Connect.

Mr Gladman told Ms Wilson that the RSA supported Victoria’s current policy settings which allow students with parental permission to take part in SRI outside curriculum time, as this allowed children and parents the choice to take part in the extra-curricular activity while not disrupting the normal learning of other students.

“Changing the SRI program to re-introduce SRI classes to normal class time would be a regressive step,” he wrote in August.

“State-sponsored segregation of children along religious lines is at odds with the principles of public education and is corrosive to social cohesion. It also has negative human rights impacts on non-participating children. 

“The Liberal Party should be clear for Victorian families and school communities on its SRI policy ahead of the upcoming state election.”

In New South Wales and Queensland, the scripture programs are held during class time, leading to the segregation of children along religious lines and forcing non-participating students to fill their time with non-curricular activities, such as doing homework or sitting in hallways or outside classrooms. 

In July this year, the RSA raised the New South Wales and Queensland programs as examples of discriminatory and unfair treatment against non-religious Australians in government institutions and programs as part of a submission to the United Nations Human Rights Council’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR) (fourth Cycle) into Australia’s human rights. The submission – supported by another eight non-religious, ex-religious and pro-secular organisations – argued that such discriminatory and unfair treatment, on the grounds of religion and belief, was inconsistent with Australia’s human rights commitments. 

Before the 2018 Victorian election, the Liberal Opposition, to the applause of the Australian Christian Lobby, promised to return SRI to class time, claiming that the policy was “not about proselytising”.

Changes to the SRI program since 2011 – requiring students be opted into SRI classes and then moving SRI to be held out-of-class hours – have resulted in the number of participating students crashing by 99 per cent.

The Rationalist Society of Australia is actively lobbying for secular reform of scripture programs in public schools. Follow our campaign here.

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Si Gladman is Executive Director of the Rationalist Society of Australia. He also hosts ‘The Secular Agenda’ podcast.

Photo: Jess Wilson MP (Facebook)