Ken O'Flynn (Cork North-Central, Independent Ireland Party)
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891. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if she will review school curriculum materials and textbooks that discuss transgender or non-binary identities to ensure that a balanced and evidence-based perspective is presented, including information on individuals who later detransition and the potential long-term and irreversible effects of medical or social transition; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [59864/25]

Ken O'Flynn (Cork North-Central, Independent Ireland Party)
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895. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if her Department has reviewed the HSE Busy Bodies booklet, which is distributed to 5th and 6th class pupils as part of the SPHE curriculum, in particular the sections referencing gender identity; whether parents were consulted before this content was included; the way in which her Department ensures that educational materials provided by external agencies, such as the HSE, are age-appropriate, evidence-based, and free from ideological bias; and if she will commit to a full review of this material in light of ongoing public concern about gender-related teaching content in primary schools. [59868/25]

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 891 and 895 together.

Apart from a small number of prescribed texts at post-primary level, determined by the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA), there are no requirements placed on a school by my Department to use any individual textbooks or resources. My Department does not generally approve, commission, sponsor or endorse educational textbooks. Textbooks are commissioned and published by educational publishers, and schools select their textbooks, if they choose to use them, from those available from a number of educational publishers. The decision on the content of a particular textbook would rest entirely within the publishers themselves. Concerns regarding material included in specific books should be raised with the relevant publisher.

In relation to Social, Personal and Health Education (SPHE) including Relationships and Sexuality Education (RSE) specifically, following a recommendation in a 2019 National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) review of RSE, a portal site was developed by the NCCA where teachers can access SPHE/RSE teaching and learning resources for all levels in primary and post-primary. The role of the online toolkits is to provide supports for teachers in preparing for and teaching SPHE/RSE. They can also be used to support professional conversations in school and for professional development at a team or whole staff level. These resources have been carefully selected to support planning for quality teaching and learning in SPHE linked to the current curriculum and are selected according to several criteria:

• it is relevant to the Irish curriculum and context;
• it is up-to-date, engaging, creative and relevant to students’ interests and needs;
• it can be used across the diversity of school settings that exist in primary and post-primary education;
• it has been developed by a state agency or an agency/organisation with a proven educational track record;
• it has not originated from a commercial source/seeking commercial benefit;
• it is freely available online.

Ken O'Flynn (Cork North-Central, Independent Ireland Party)
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902. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills when the updated relationship and sexuality education curriculum will be fully implemented across all post-primary and primary schools; if the new programme will explicitly address issues of consent, pornography, and digital respect; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [59877/25]

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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The SPHE and Wellbeing curriculum strives to foster an understanding and appreciation of all children. Through the curriculum objectives, children are supported to develop self-confidence and a positive sense of self, and to appreciate and respect the human and cultural diversity that exists in society. To this end, the curriculum aims to foster in the child a sense of care and respect for himself/herself and others and an appreciation of the dignity of every human being. The curriculum at all levels has been updated in recent years, following a 2019 National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) review of RSE across primary and post-primary.

At primary level a new curriculum specification for Wellbeing, including SPHE, was published in September 2025. The Wellbeing curriculum is designed to support children’s overall development. It integrates Physical Education (PE) and Social, Personal and Health Education (SPHE) to equip children with the knowledge, skills, concepts, dispositions, attitudes and values needed to lead active, healthy, and fulfilling lives.This is now being rolled out in the 2025/2026 school year. The 2025/2026 school year will be an introductory year focusing on the Primary Curriculum Framework. From the 2026/2027 school year, schools can avail of focused support in one curriculum area each year, with each area taking two years to fully enact. Schools can choose the order of enactment, but the Wellbeing specification must be one of the first three areas selected.

An updated Junior Cycle SPHE specification was approved by the then Minister and published by the NCCA in May 2023 and was rolled out for first years in all schools from September 2023.

An updated Senior Cycle specification was approved by the then Minister and published in September 2024. This is being introduced in September 2025 for those entering Leaving Certificate Applied, replacing older modules within LCA Social Education. Post-Primary schools have until September 2027 to introduce the specification for other students entering fifth, to accommodate the necessary planning and preparatory work.

All curriculum developments are informed by research, based in Ireland and also internationally. The research base for developments provides a sound basis for developing specifications to ensure that the knowledge, skills, dispositions and values of a curriculum are age appropriate. All topics are addressed in all the specifications in a way that is age and stage appropriate.

The Primary Wellbeing specification includes new and important areas of learning which includes consent (Stages 1-4). This supports children to understand bodily autonomy, recognise boundaries and practise seeking, giving or refusing permission effectively in everyday interactions to support the development of respectful relationships and support children’s safety. The Wellbeing curriculum includes among its learning outcomes that, at different stages, children should be able to establish, build and maintain healthy relationships, recognising the importance of respectful interactions, consent and effective communication, and to identify, discuss and evaluate key aspects of healthy relationships, such as consent, effective communication, mutual respect and trust, appreciating the importance of healthy relationships for wellbeing.

One of the learning objectives of the updated Junior Cycle SPHE specification is that students should be able to appreciate the importance of seeking, giving and receiving consent in sexual relationships, from the perspective of building caring relationships and from a legal perspective. As for Senior Cycle SPHE, the learning outcomes include that students should be able to discuss the need for consent and the importance of care, respect, empathy, trust and mutual pleasure within a sexual relationship, and to identify and consider common signs of abusive relationships, including coercive control.

Pornography is an issue which was frequently brought up in consultation during the review of RSE which was published in 2019. The report on the public consultation on the draft Junior Cycle SPHE specification tells us that there was a strong welcome from many consultation participants for the learning outcome that refers to understanding the influence of pornography, whereby students should be able to discuss the influence of popular culture and the online world, in particular, the influence of pornography, on young people’s understanding, expectations and social norms in relation to sexual expression. At Senior Cycle, one of the learning outcomes is that students should be able to investigate the possible influence of pornography on attitudes, behaviours and relationship expectations and what supports are available for those impacted by pornography.

There are two key messages in relation to pornography in the SPHE specification: pornography presents violent and degrading behaviours that do not reflect healthy real-life relationships and exposure to pornography can have harmful effects. Pornography can have a negative effect on young people's understanding of relationships as by normalising harmful and violent behaviour. It also can contribute to violence against women by objectifying them and trivialising aggression, which can encourage some young men to perform violent sex and to a disrespect for women.

There is ongoing engagement between my Department and the Department of Justice in respect of the development and implementation of Zero Tolerance, the Third National Strategy for DSGBV. My Department is represented on the Third National DSGBV Strategy Advisory Group as well as the National Awareness Campaigns Advisory Group. The Zero Tolerance Plan commits to develop education and public information campaigns which raise awareness of the harm of pornography and of how the sex trade and pornography fuel misogyny and violence against women and undermine gender equality.

In relation to the issue of digital respect, the updated Primary Wellbeing curriculum provides children with an understanding of basic digital safety skills for appropriate and responsible use of digital technologies, and to adopt strategies to promote safe, ethical and responsible use of digital technologies, recognising personal and communal responsibility in fostering a positive, respectful and safer digital environment and understand safe ways to report inappropriate or harmful behaviours or content.

The updated Junior Cycle SPHE curriculum includes among its learning outcomes that students should be able to assess the benefits and difficulties associated with their online world and discuss strategies for dealing with a range of scenarios that might arise, to discuss how to share personal information, images, opinions and emotions in a safe, responsible and respectful manner online and in person and to explore why young people share sexual imagery online and examine the risks and consequences of doing this. At Senior Cycle, learning outcomes include discussion of image based abuse, while students are able to examine how both positive and harmful attitudes around gender are perpetuated in the media, online, and in society and discuss strategies for challenging and changing harmful attitudes and narratives.