Despite widespread reports that masks are to be required in classrooms as pupils return to schools across the country today, the updated Government guidance shows that this is only a recommendation, not a requirement. Here is the relevant section (emphasis mine).
Where pupils in Year 7 (which would be children who were aged 11 on August 31st 2021) and above are educated, we recommend that face coverings should be worn by pupils, staff and adult visitors when moving around the premises, outside of classrooms, such as in corridors and communal areas. This is a temporary measure.
From January 4th, we also recommend that in those schools where pupils in Year 7 and above are educated, face coverings should be worn in classrooms. This does not apply in situations where wearing a face covering would impact on the ability to take part in exercise or strenuous activity, for example in PE lessons. This will also be a temporary measure. …
We would not ordinarily expect teachers to wear a face covering in the classroom if they are at the front of the class, to support education delivery, although settings should be sensitive to the needs of individual teachers. …
Face coverings do not need to be worn when outdoors.
Schools, as employers, have a duty to comply with the Equality Act 2010 which includes making reasonable adjustments for disabled staff. They also have a duty to make reasonable adjustments for disabled pupils, to support them to access education successfully. No pupil should be denied education on the grounds that they are not wearing a face covering.
It should be noted that this is guidance for schools rather than pupils, so a school might decide to follow the Government recommendation by requiring its pupils to wear face masks. However, they should still not deny education to pupils if they do not wear one. The usual exemptions also apply, including where wearing a mask causes “severe distress” and “to avoid the risk of harm or injury to yourself or others” (and let’s face it, how can covering your mouth and nose for most of the day with an item that obstructs breathing, gathers germs, contains harmful levels of toxic substances, and prevents normal human interaction not put you at risk of harm?).
Government coronavirus guidance can be found here.
If readers have any stories of pupils being penalised for not wearing a mask you can email us here.
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Ok but using the ridiculous term “trans women” is completely impartial. Got that. I hope Webb resigns.
They are males, no ifs no buts.
He should not simply accept this and fade into the background. Instead he should double down and dare them to sack him.
Tribunal? FSU?
Given that this is the BBC inverting itself and given that the BBC is a wholly discredited organisation and certainly not worthy of our time I think we can safely ignore yet more of their cretinous stupidity.
I’m on holiday and it’s raining so I thought I would waste some of my time complaining about this article which keeps referring to a man as a woman: Jorge Carreno murder: Scarlet Blake confessed murder to her ex, court hears – BBC News on the grounds that it breaks their impartiality rules. Let’s see what weasel words will come back to me.
Great stuff tof. I look forward to reading the response.
Me too.
Willy = Man
No willy = Woman
BBC needs to cease to exist, we’d all be better off.
Had willy removed = mutilated man
Like the bloke given the whole life tariff for a double murder today did to his male victim.
From now on, I shall assume that when the BBC uses the word “sky” it really means “ground” and visa versa.
The BBC is a place where objective truths have become subjective – even inverted.
There is nothing controversial about the biological differences between man and woman. That the BBC should seek to sow doubt about this most fundamental of matters makes me now certain the BBC is in the grip of Satanists.
One person complained about this. ONE PERSON. The BBC needed merely to acknowledge the complaint, not go all out to uphold it. Desperate times. I was brought up on BBC Radio 4 and in particular I loved their drama. All that changed long ago, and it’s now beyond repair.
They take license fee money from right wing and left wing viewers but only present left wing views. ——–How can they justify that? They can’t actually. So they use tactics like omitting things and getting Joe Bloggs off the street to say what they want to say.
There is nothing controversial about the biological differences between man and woman.
As pointed out in an older comment: Someone who is having controverses with objectively verifiable reality is – by definition – deranged as that’s not something people can have different opinions about. The sun is hot. And someone who claims otherwise is either mentally ill or a swindler.
I rather fear that my old chum Chief Petty Officer Hoare (RN ret’d.) would have found himself at a loss these days:
In a voice like an anchor being dragged up a gravel beach, “Easy to identify a woman, young ‘un – long hair, bumps in the front and dances backwards”.
Ee … it’s more complicated these days.
My friends silly daughter identifies as a hedgehog because she saw one get runover one day. Is calling her a girl a “hate crime”?
She has a death wish?
BBC News yesterday managed to report the death of this ‘trans prisoner’ without referring to him as either ‘him’ or ‘her’, or ‘he’ or ‘she’.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-68442073
What a ridiculous amount of cowardly effort to make!
I don’t mind they avoided all pronouns in the text. It was clear in the picture and from the context that he was male.
It’s not a bad strategy to skirt the issue entirely. I know someone trans, serves drinks in my pub. Most definitely doesn’t ‘pass’. I talk to him regularly, we enjoy the same music. I avoid all pronouns when talking to/about him, and I use only the person’s name, even if I must repeat myself. I absolutely won’t talk politics to him. Nor will I ever call him ‘her’
Let’s see … someone correctly stating that men are male is endorsing a viewpoint in a highly controversial area but the opposite statement, namely, wrongly claiming that some men are actually female, isn’t?
How so?
The BBC is immune to criticism. There’s a revolving door between them and Ofcom staff.
The only effective way to protest is to withhold payment. I haven’t paid the telly tax since 2019, nothing serious has happened
Drop the trans junk writing. It is a small minority of people who seem to get the majority of attention. We have had enough.
You shouldn’t have any problems to find enough sand somewhere to bury your head in it.
Just imagine the number of complaints the BBC gets every day that are either ignored or treated with word salad, and yet they choose to investigate this based on just one single complaint from a blue haired loon. So glad I no longer fund the British bullshit corporation.