Stage 1 Briefing

November 2025. We provided a briefing to MSPs ahead of the Stage 1 debate on the above bill.

Key points:

Part 1

• We cannot support Part 1 of this Bill in its current form.
• The proposals in Part 1 do not go as far as required by the UN Committee of the Rights of the Child, because they do not give children an independent right to opt out of religious observance.
• Religious education (RE) and religious observance (RO) continue to be conflated. A clear distinction should be made.

Part 2

• Part 2 of the Bill amends the UNCRC Act; we believe that further amendments should be brought to strengthen the Act to ensure that incompatibilities in Scottish legislation are identified and addressed.

We will only support the General Principles of this Bill if there is a commitment from the Cabinet Secretary for substantial amendment at Stage 2.

Part 1

We have made it clear to the Scottish Government, in our consultation response[1], in meetings with officials and in our Stage 1 evidence[2] that we cannot support Part 1 as currently drafted. It requires substantial amendments.

By failing to provide children with an independent right to opt out of religious observance, the government failed to address the recommendation made by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child in their 2023 Concluding Observations. This does not reflect the maximalist approach to children’s rights the Scottish Government has previous committed to. Our view is that it does not meaningfully progress children’s rights.

The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child has made it clear that, in terms of the UNCRC, “it is the child who exercises the right to freedom of religion, not the parent, and the parental role necessarily diminishes as the child acquires an increasingly active role in exercising choice throughout adolescence”.[3] 

Our position is that where any opt out exists, this should be extended to children, in line with their evolving capacities. We therefore call on the Scottish Government to bring forward amendment at Stage 2 to address this.

We welcome the Equalities, Human Rights and Civil Justice Committee’s (majority) recommendation that Religious and Moral Education (RME) and Religious Observance (RO) should be separated. We agree that RME, when taught in line with national guidance, represents an important part of a human rights-based education.

We repeat our concern that the Scottish Government continues to draft legislation that is outwith the scope of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (Incorporation) (Scotland) Act 2024 (the Incorporation Act). We welcome and share the Committee’s expression of disappointment at this approach. However, we note the Committee’s conclusion that it would be too complex to redraft or amend in this case, at this stage. We would however welcome a thorough review of the 1980 Act with a view to re-legislating and bringing all Scottish education law within scope of the Incorporation Act in the next parliament. 

Part 2

As the Committee notes in its Stage 1 report, we expressed concern in our written and oral evidence about Part 2 of the Bill. We noted that there requires to be further amendment to strengthen the 2024 Act and ensure that legislative incompatibilities are identified and addressed by public authorities, the courts and Scottish Ministers. We provided a number of such potential amendments to Scottish Government and to the Committee. 

In particular we noted that in order for us to support the proposals in Part 2 we would require to see a duty on public bodies to report to the Scottish Government and the Commissioner’s office any occasion where they become aware of a requirement in law that compels them to act in a way that is not compliant with the UNCRC requirements. We do not consider that this would be an onerous or disproportionate measure. The Government’s assessment is that this provision would need to be triggered on an infrequent and irregular basis.

While we broadly welcome the Scottish Government’s acknowledgement in the Children’s Rights Scheme that it must actively seek information from public authorities on legislative incompatibilities, the provisions set out in the Scheme are in our view not sufficient to discharge the Scottish Government’s positive obligations to identify and address any situation where a child’s rights are (or are at a significant risk of) not being fulfilled and to secure better or further effect of the rights of children. This is particularly the case given that the Scottish Government has not undertaken an audit of existing legislative incompatibilities with the UNCRC Act and does not propose to do so for another twelve months.   The draft amendments we have shared with the Scottish Government would strengthen the Bill and support the Government’s expressed policy intention to ensure that legislation is compliant with children’s rights. We note the Cabinet Secretary has already committed to including a reporting requirement in statutory guidance, and we welcome her willingness to discuss this and other amendments at Stage 2.

[1] CYPCS 2025. Religious observance in schools. https://www.cypcs.org.uk/resources/religious-observance-in-schools/

[2] CYPCS, 2025. Children (Withdrawal from Religious Education and Amendment of UNCRC Compatibility Duty) (Scotland) Bill. https://www.cypcs.org.uk/resources/children-withdrawal-from-religious-education-and-amendment-of-uncrc-compatibility-duty-scotland-bill/

[3] UN Committee on the Rights of the Child. General Comment 20 (2016) on the rights of the child during adolescence.  https://docs.un.org/en/CRC/C/GC/20