Teachers will be unable to answer important questions from pupils if age restrictions on sex education lesson content are introduced, sector experts warn

Teachers stand to be prevented from discussing sensitive topics raised with them by pupils under government moves to introduce age restrictions within relationships, sex and health education (RSHE) lessons, sector experts are warning.

During half-term, the Department for Education announced the remit for a controversial new “independent advisory panel,” which would inform the government’s upcoming three-year review of the subject.

Central to this, it is clear from the remit itself, is expected to be the introduction of age limits, below which an as-yet-to-be-determined list of sensitive topics within the subject are not to be taught.

Rishi Sunak highlighted the government’s upcoming review of the subject in response to a question in the Commons on the subject from the Conservative backbencher Miriam Cates, who had said that pupils were facing lessons which were “age inappropriate, extreme, sexualising and inaccurate”.

This had followed a report which Ms Cates had commissioned, from an organisation called the New Social Covenant which she co-founded. Widely labelled the “Cates Dossier,” this had warned of “mounting evidence of age-appropriate teaching” within RSHE, although the evidence base behind such a claim has been questioned*.

The panel’s remit