Violence against women and girls strategy: Boys to be sent on courses to tackle misogyny in schools

Teachers will be given training to spot and tackle misogyny in the classroom, while high-risk pupils could be sent on behavioural courses as part of the government’s long-awaited strategy to halve violence against women and girls (VAWG) in the next decade.

The plans for schools in England – which focus on preventing the radicalisation of young men – have been unveiled as part of a wider strategy which had been delayed three times.

Teachers will get specialist training around issues such as consent and the dangers of sharing intimate images.

Responding to the announcement, the domestic abuse commissioner for England and Wales, Dame Nicole Jacobs, said the commitments did “not go far enough”.

She said while the strategy recognised the scale of the challenge, the level of investment “falls seriously short”.

The £20m package will also see teachers get training around how to identify positive role models, and how to challenge unhealthy myths about women and relationships.

It will include a new helpline for teenagers to get support for concerns about abuse in their own relationships.

The government hopes that by tackling the early roots of misogyny, it will prevent young men from becoming violent abusers.

Under the new plans, schools will send high-risk students to get extra care and support, including behavioural courses to tackle their prejudice against women and girls.

Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch criticised the move, accusing the government of “silly gimmicks”.

She told the BBC the plans were only being rolled out because “the government spent most of the summer watching Adolescence” – the Netflix drama that explored the impact of social media and influencers on teenage boys.

She instead called for more police officers, saying “we need to remove people from our country who shouldn’t be here – especially those who come from cultures where women are treated as third class citizens. That would be a much smarter place to begin”.

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said he did not intend to “diminish the focus on the men that are the perpetrators of this violence”, but said the government must address the misogyny and inequality that were the root cause. He added part of that was showing a “positive, aspirational vision for boys and men”.

Safeguarding minister Jess Phillips described violence against women and girls as a “national emergency”, adding the government’s aim was to be “so ambitious that we change culture”.

Liberal Democrats spokeswoman for women and equalities Marie Goldman welcomed training for teachers but said unless it was accompanied by steps to “properly moderate online content” she had no doubt it would fail.

As part of the wider strategy, the Home Office has also announced a ban on “nudification” tools, which use generative AI to turn images of real people into fake nude pictures and videos without their permission. How this will work has not been made clear.

Phillips said the government would work with tech companies to make it impossible for children to take, view or share nude images through “nudity detection filters”.

Schools to take part in the teacher training pilot will be chosen next year, while ministers will aim for all secondary schools to teach healthy relationship sessions by the end of this Parliament.

The taxpayer will foot £16m of the bill, while the government says it is working closely with philanthropists and other partners on an innovation fund for the remaining £4m.

The funding covers the three-year spending review period.

Nearly 40% of teenagers in relationships are victims of abuse, domestic abuse charity Reducing the Risk has said.

Online influencers are partly blamed for feeding this, with nearly one in five boys aged 13 to 15 said to hold a positive view of the self-proclaimed misogynist Andrew Tate, according to a YouGov poll.

Schools in England are already required to identify and tackle misogyny and some teachers said schools were already doing the kind of work in the new measures.

Sukhjot Dhami, principal at Beacon Hill Academy in Dudley, said: “The challenge isn’t starting from scratch: it’s ensuring that this £20m is spent wisely and in partnership with schools already leading the way.”

Pressed on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on which measures were new, Phillips said teachers currently did not have anywhere “specialist or targeted” to send pupils who were showing signs of sexually harmful behaviour.

The Department for Education’s statutory guidance already says secondary pupils should be taught about consent, the negative impacts of pornography on sexual relationships, and that sharing and viewing of indecent images of children is a crime.

Updated guidance, due to be rolled out from September, specifies that pupils “should be equipped to recognise misogyny”, as well as its links to violence against women and girls, and understand the importance of challenging it.

Paul Whiteman, general secretary of school leaders’ union NAHT, said it was positive the government was recognising the importance of training and support for school staff but said schools were “just part of the solution”.

Pepe Di’Iasio, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said it was essential the government introduced “effective measures to prevent at source the spread of online misogynistic content which is served up to young people by social media algorithms”.

Nicola Mclafferty, 42, a victim of domestic violence, said survivors of domestic abuse, both men and women, should go into school assemblies to speak to children about it and share their lived experience.

The government has announced a raft of measures in its overall VAWG strategy, including the introduction of specialist investigators to every police force to oversee rape and sexual offence cases and the wider rollout of domestic abuse protection orders after a trial.

These mean individuals can be banned from contacting a victim, visiting their home or posting harmful content online.

Announcing the package in the Commons, Phillips said the strategy would deploy “the full force of the state” across local and national government to prevent VAWG.

She said the strategy was backed by £1bn funding for victims support, including for safe housing.

Other measures include better NHS support for child and adult survivors of abuse, and a funding boost for councils to provide safe housing for domestic abuse survivors.