Daily Telegraph – 5 April 1983

Whether or not the particular plays complained of by Mr Tebbit (reports, March 28 and 29) were pro-CND propaganda, no-one can be in any doubt of the deplorable attempts being made to politicise the classroom by the forcing of such pseudo-subjects as "peace studies" onto the curriculum.

Is it not high time that responsible Ministers instituted and examination of the current provisions of the Education Act to see if they afford adequate safeguards against the political indoctrination of minors at school?

If such provisions already exist, then they should be strictly enforced. If they do not, then a commitment to protect children from the ideological preferences and prejudices of their teachers should be included in a future Conservative election manifesto.

There is, after all, no self-evident reason for ideologically committed school teachers being less willing to abuse positions of trust than have been ideologically committed Foreign Office diplomats (or Professors of Art History) in the past.

Dr JULIAN LEWIS
Prospective Conservative Parliamentary Candidate
Swansea West
Swansea