Can I also say I’m very pleased to be able to speak in this debate, and thank Hannah for bringing forward the motion—and the support from other Members? In the previous debate, a number of Members spoke on the importance of education in raising awareness among young people on the issue of gender-based violence. Well, the role of education in tackling prejudice and bullying around LGBT issues is no less significant, and that was something that Hannah referred to when she was moving this motion. But, before I go on to cover the main points that I wanted to talk about, can I just mention the Icons and Allies exhibition that we visited at lunchtime? It was very interesting to see Illtyd Harrington there, who was the Labour deputy leader of the Greater London Council, who was actually from Merthyr Tydfil. He’d lived openly gay with his partner in London way back in the 1980s, and I tweeted about that, and it was lovely to get a reply from a very good gay friend of mine from Merthyr, who said, ‘It’s good to see that things have moved on and that people no longer have to leave their area just to be themselves’. And that just made me smile and made me recognise how much things have moved on.

However, I want to focus on two particular areas of education, and that is the role of school staff and the role of school governors. I don’t generally like to rattle off statistics, but a school report by Stonewall in 2012 identified that 55 per cent of lesbian, gay and bisexual pupils had experienced some form of bullying based on their sexual orientation, and 83 per cent of trans young people have experienced verbal abuse, with 35 per cent suffering physical assault. And the vast majority of staff in schools, I think, do want to be able to deal with homophobic, biphobic or transphobic bullying in their school, but all too often don’t feel that they have the tools or the confidence to be able to do so. As Mark Reckless mentioned, it’s now over 13 years since we scrapped section 28, but there are still many staff working in our schools today who had to deliver education services under the threat and fear of prosecution from that pernicious piece of legislation, and for some, working in a new environment of openness around LGBT issues—they can still present a challenge as it’s conflicting with those who are more comfortable in actively wanting to tackle homophobic, biphobic and trans bullying.

Unsurprisingly, there is clear evidence of lower rates of bullying and higher rates of achievement amongst LGBT pupils in those schools that have made positive strides towards including LGBT issues within their teaching, but if school staff feel they need more support in tackling these issues, then surely school governors must have a role to play. There was another Stonewall report in 2014, which identified that only one in five secondary school teachers and one in six primary school teachers in Wales said that their governors had a directed, clear leadership role when it came to tackling bullying of LGBT pupils. I guess the first step in addressing this problem is probably to ensure that, as far as possible, the make-up of our school governors reflects the local community and that all school governing bodies should be looking to recruit more LGBT members who can make a significant contribution to reducing bullying as their own life experiences would more readily equip them to do so. But regardless of this, all school governors, whether LGBT or not, have a clear duty to tackle all forms of bullying in their schools. There are many measures that they can take to ensure that LGBT pupils do not become the victims of bullying, and that includes: ensuring that schools’ anti-bullying policies include specific reference to LGBT-related bullying; ensuring that governing bodies are regularly presented with figures on LGBT-related bullying and incidents; asserting what training has been provided to school staff on how to prevent or deal with LGBT bullying and support for victims; ensuring the training of all governors in school on LGBT issues; and getting the school to sign up to Stonewall’s school champions programme.

I also made reference in the last debate to the development of the new curriculum and I’ll add a further plea. There’s a golden opportunity for LGBT-inclusive sex and relationships education to be a part of this new curriculum. This would make it compulsory for school governing bodies to take fully into account LGBT issues and any commitment to moving in this direction would give a greater incentive to school governors to embrace the sort of initiatives I’ve outlined.

So, as someone who’s been a lifelong campaigner for equality in all its streams, I’m delighted to be supporting this motion that celebrates LGBT history month and recognise that progress has been made. But there is also a need for continued vigilance and for Wales to continue to take a lead in this area.