The people who are most affected by Fred Nile’s attempts to undermine ethics classes are children – our children! Many of them could be directly impacted by Nile’s proposition to have ethics classes discontinued, but may not know they can do something about this.

Since January 2011, ethics classes have been available to children in years 5 and 6 in over 170 NSW public primary schools. However, ethics classes can only run if a school has volunteers to coordinate and teach them. This year, Primary Ethics plans to extend the classes to children in years 3 and 4. This more…

We’re talking to the Ethics class inquiry tomorrow (24th Feb at 9.30am). We’d love your support! Macquarie Room
New South Wales Parliament, Macquarie Street, Sydney

The deadline for submissions to the inquiry into the Ethics Classes is 24th Feb. If you haven’t already done so, please consider making a submission. Instructions here.

The Committee of Inquiry consisting of seven members of NSW parliament interviewed 40 witnesses over three days. There was a wide range of views, but having attended all three days our take is that there was support for ethics classes from almost all corners.

Would ethics volunteers allow inappropriate issues to creep into ethics class discussion? No, they would not.

I just spent my evening reading Fred Nile’s publication “Family World News” Volume 18 Number 9 (September 2011), which had been brought to my attention as a collection of objections to ethics classes. I was not surprised to find titles such as “Ethics Classes: The Case Against” and “Roll Back Children’s Philosophy Classes” but I was surprised by the apparent lack of knowledge and understanding of ethics classes.