CP Exclusive: Consultations show support for repealed Ontario sex-ed curriculum
TORONTO — An overwhelming majority of those who weighed in on Ontario’s sex education on the first day of public consultations opposed Premier Doug Ford’s repeal of a modernized curriculum introduced by the previous Liberal government.
Respondents identifying themselves as students, parents and social workers flooded the ForTheParents.ca website with messages hours after it opened in late August, following weeks of controversy over the fate of the curriculum.
Roughly 1,600 submissions obtained by The Canadian Press through a freedom of information request show the vast majority called for the modernized 2015 curriculum to be reinstated. About two dozen messages spoke in favour of the Progressive Conservative government’s decision to repeal the document and temporarily replace it with one based on the 1998 curriculum.
“With the changes you have made to the curriculum you are putting children at risk. Not all parents are comfortable teaching their children the proper anatomical names and body safety but this is crucial,” wrote one person who said they were a parent and a child protection worker for the Children’s Aid Society.