FOI Appeal to Access Secret Lesson Plan

Transparency in schools

Summary

Clare Page, mother of a 15 year old female student, was denied to access to the slides used to teach sex education to her daughter. Page was concerned by her daughter’s report of the content of the lesson. She was further told that she had no right to know who was teaching the lesson. Page made a Freedom of Information request but it was declined by Haberdashers’ Hatcham College on grounds of commercial secrecy for the charity and privacy for the teacher. Page then referred the case to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO). 

In a landmark decision, the ICO backed the school's choice to keep the lesson and teacher's identity secret from parents. Page asserts that this is prioritising the commercial interest of a third party education provider over the public interest of parents to know what their children are taught and prioritising the privacy of the teacher over safeguarding concerns.

More information can be found at at Page’s crowd funder here. Find Page on Twitter as @NoSecretLessons

Letter from The Rt Hon Gillian Keegan MP Secretary of State for Education (23 October 2023) on need to share curriculum materials with parents

Status

Appeal in Upper Tier Tribunal: concluded on 16 & 17 September 2024. Judgment reserved.

First Tier Tribunal: Evidence was concluded in a single day - 3 May 2023. Submissions were heard on 10 May. Her appeal was dismissed and she is now appealing to the Upper Tribunal.

UPDATE: 17th September 2025 - The Upper Tribunal dismissed Ms Page's appeal against a decision by the First-tier Tribunal. Read the judgment here

Live Tweet Threads

The remote access technology used by the Upper Tier Tribunal on 16 September 2024 failed and needed to be reconnected several times. This resulted in some minor interruptions plus no coverage for approximately the last 45 minutes of the afternoon session.

We were unable to provide any substantive reporting from the morning session on 17 September 2024. A short thread is included for completeness and the vivid description of the noise problem by our reporter.

Upper Tier Tribunal Appeal

16 September 2024 - morning session, afternoon Part 1, afternoon Part 2

17 September 2024 - morning session, afternoon Part 1, afternoon Part 2

First Tier Tribunal

Morning session 3 May - part 1

Morning session 3 May- part 2

Afternoon session - 3 May

10 May - Submissions

Published Documents

6 June 2023 - First-tier Tribunal General Regulatory Chamber Information Rights Between CLARE PAGE Appellant and (1) THE INFORMATION COMMISSIONER (2) SCHOOL OF SEXUALITY EDUCATION

29 September 2022 - Original Decision - Freedom of Information Act Decision Notice: Page vs Haberdashers’ Aske’s Federation Trust

Abbreviations - UTT

CP - Clare Page, parent
J - Judge Mitchell, sitting alone
SSE - School of Sexuality Education
HHC - Haberdashers Hatcham College

ICO - Information Commissioners Office

JM - Jonathan Moss, barrister for CP
WP -Will Perry, barrister for ICO
SW - Susan Wright, barrister for SSE

Abbreviations - FTT

JB: Judge Buckley

CP: Clare Page, mother who made the complaint

SSE: School of Sexuality Education
ZG: Zoe Gannon , counsel for CP
SW: Susan Wright, counsel for SSE
DP: Dolly Padalia, CEO of SSE

Press Coverage

Links to selected press coverage are included without comment and are not endorsed by Tribunal Tweets. This is a sample of coverage only, with most recent first - it is not comprehensive. Please DM our main Twitter account to submit coverage from an established news outlet. Any paywalled article must be archived.

29th September 2025

Local Government Lawyer - Upper Tribunal rejects appeal by mother over access to sex education teaching materials

22nd September 2025

Monckton Chambers - First-of-its-kind case on parents’ rights to information on sex education lessons

19th July 2023

Daily Mail - All I wanted to know was what my daughters were learning in sex education

23rd June 2023

Christian Institute - Mother refuses to abandon quest for public scrutiny of sex ed resources

13th June 2023

Times - Mother to fight on in case to make sex education lessons public

13th June 2023

SoSE - School of Sexuality Education welcomes Tribunal decision

3rd May 2023

Times - Sex education group regrets web links to fetish material

10th July 2022

Telegraph - Parents blocked from checking their child’s trans sex education lessons

1st July 2022

Daily Mail - 'My daughter was told to call historical figures 'they' rather than he or she - that's when alarm bells rang': Mother reveals her battle to see what her 13-year-old was being taught about sexuality and white privilege at school

29th June 2022

Daily Mail - Parents have a right to know what our children are taught, says JENNI MURRAY

26th June 2022

Daily Mail - Parents demand legal right to view school lesson plans after removing daughter from London secondary over fears she was being 'indoctrinated' by classes on white privilege and gender

The Times - Parents’ battle to see ‘secret’ lessons on white privilege