Sex education and trans rights are hard topics in Scottish schools

The Scottish Government is currently running a public consultation on how it might reform sex and relationship education in schools - what is currently called Relationships, Sexual Health and Parenthood (RSHP) - and which closes on November 23.

It is looking to revise the current education offering - dating from 2014 - in light of recommendations that more must be done to embed LGBT-inclusive education across the curriculum and to review how Personal and Social Education (PSE) is delivered.

One thing the summary does is set out how important parental views are. "Parents and carers are the primary educators of their children," it says, adding that they "should be aware of the content of proposed RSHP education" and still have the right to remove their child from RSHP classes should they have concerns about the "appropriateness of content".

Revised guidance has been updated, it goes on, to give more detailed guidance on how "parents' and carers' rights can be honoured". This is where things get sticky.

In England - quick reminder that education is devolved and so the systems differ - there are concerns that parents' and carers' rights are not being honoured because there is a block on them being able to view the material being shown to children and young people.

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In response, the education secretary, famously never one to sit on her arse, has written to schools in England to tell them to make the information used to teach children about sex and relationships available to parents.

In what is a second letter sent to schools on the issue of what is known down south as relationships, sex and health education (RSHE), Gillian Keegan has told head teachers there can be "no ifs, no buts, no more excuses."

Except, of course, there can. Complicating the issue is a recent legal challenge by parent Clare Page, a mother in London who took her local council to court after an FOI request to view her daughter's sex education resources was declined.

What complicates the issue is that materials are not created by teaching staff or public education authorities but by outside private companies contracted to provide materials to schools.

A tribunal ruled, in Ms Page's case, that the commercial interests of the sex education company to protect its resources outweighed the public interest in viewing the material.

This has become a contentious topic taken up by the Conservative MP Miriam Cates, who is spearheading parents' and carers' right to know in England by petitioning for her draft Relationships and Sex Education (Transparency) Bill, which she wants to be introduced in the forthcoming King's Speech.

It seems like this should be superfluous legislation - why is compulsion necessary when it seems so straightforwardly uncontentious that parents should be able to view the content being taught to their children?

In her Telegraph column last week she writes: "Too many examples of shocking RSE materials have come to light, containing graphic and sexualised content that is deeply inappropriate for children."

I've seen on social media examples of texts that I imagine are the same types of materials the honourable lady is referring to. The problem with these is that they come unreferenced - are they available in UK schools or are they Australian and American materials only? How widespread are they? It's not clear.

You could argue that this merely reinforces the position - we don't know, because some parents in some places are being kept in the dark.

The crux of the argument is the right of adults to know what their children are being exposed to in school but the - already complicated - issue has been further complicated by becoming parental rights versus the commercial interests of private contractors.

Not everyone seems to understand the distinction. Clare Adamson, the SNP MSP, appeared on BBC Scotland's Debate Night and said that the priority should be, not parental concern, but "what the educators want to do" and rely on "experts within schools".

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It is easier, perhaps, for parents to accept an expert voice on teaching a topic like maths or French or science than it is on other issues, sex and relationship education being one such. And you cannot discount the question: who decides what counts as "expert" in the case of third party organisations?

Parents will approve and disapprove of certain outside agencies based on their own moral and political opinions. Adults can be squeamish about sex education for all sorts of reasons - from religious objections to valid concerns about content to simple pearl clutching to outright bigotry.

We saw the worst of this with the so-called "schools sex survey" last year when the debate around a schools health and wellbeing survey descended into talk of "kiddy sex surveys" pushed by "pervy politicians"

Actually, at least that's up front and open. Some of the objections are more insidious. Concern is not a weasel word and it should not be treated as such but "concern" can, in cases, be used as a front for bigotry.

There's also a generational gap. Generally, young people now are far more informed at a far younger age than in previous generations.

One of the voices backing Ms Cates is Nick Fletcher MP, whose previously stated views give a good example of why there are concerns about the motivations of those sticking their oar into the discussion.

In June this year Mr Fletcher made comments in the House of Commons that blamed women not using contraception for the demand for abortion. Perhaps some sex ed lessons could be delivered at Westminster, specifically in how many people it takes to make a baby.

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In Scotland, one of the concerns around new sex ed materials is the inclusion - as part of the embedding of LGBT-inclusive teaching - of teaching around trans rights and gender.

Not everyone believes in the concept of gender identity and some parents, while they are happy about the teaching of trans rights, they are unhappy about the teaching of gender ideology as fact rather than as theory.

This creates concerns about what children will be taught and, given the highly contentious nature of the issue, in turn gives schools pause in sharing materials on the topic.

It goes without saying that schools should work openly and collegiately with parents to create a cohesive community around a child, a collection of adults all working in that child's best interests.

Safeguarding is put forward as a concern in this debate - generally that children are being inappropriately exposed in schools to sexualised materials or so-described contentious gender identity theory. It's also a safeguarding issue to keep children ignorant about sex, consent and how they protect their physical and emotional health.

This relies on a degree of trust in teachers to ensure they are making the best decisions for the welfare of the young people in their care. That includes ensuring there is a high test for withholding information from parents and sex education materials does not meet it.

LGBT-inclusive education is designed to challenge bigotry and misconceptions - which can't be done by sneaking information past parents.

But what should make us really uncomfortable is when anyone takes an absolute stance on this. There can be no absolutes, just an intention to do the best for the child and work around that.

It's complicated when the facts of life are disputed as not being facts at all; it takes parents and schools working together to work it out with good faith willing from all parties. What a pity for young people that such a suggestion seems so utterly naïve.