The president of the Union of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations — the main umbrella group for London’s Charedi communities — has denounced measures to regulate yeshivot in the government’s new education Bill as “alarming”.
In an op-ed in the JC, Rabbi Binyomin Stern disputed the need for new regulations that would enable inspections of religious institutions which are currently exempt from them.
The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill would require local authorities to keep registers of children who are being home-schooled or otherwise taught in out-of-school settings, such as yeshivot.
An estimated 1,500 to 2,000 boys from the age of 13 to 16 are taught in unregistered yeshivot where they receive an exclusively religious education.
But the education of yeshivot is considered too narrow to classify them as schools under the current law, so they are exempt from registration and inspection by Ofsted.
The new Bill would force yeshivot to register and make them subject to the same requirements as independent schools. They would then be expected to teach secular subjects and also LGBT awareness.
The government is also proposing to give Ofsted new powers to inspect unregistered institutions as well as enabling the Education Secretary to suspend those found not to be complying with the regulations.
UOHC leader: Rabbi Binyomin Stern
In his reaction to the Bill, Rabbi Stern said, “Our yeshivahs are distinct and different and foster a lifelong love of learning. Yeshivahs are not schools and are not intended to replace them.
“Yeshivah attendees are home-educated in secular studies, as are tens of thousands of others across the United Kingdom.”
While the UOHC recognised the need for government action to support vulnerable children, he said that yeshivot “maintain robust safeguarding measures and provide safe and supportive environments where students thrive through mentorship, peer interaction and structured learning”.
Decrying some of the proposals in the Bill, he said, “The inherent data protection risks in a compulsory register for children-not-in-school and the expanded enforcement powers proposed for Ofsted are alarming.”
For 70 years, yeshivot had been “the cornerstone of our community,” he said. “We simply ask to be allowed to peacefully continue our way of life.”
However, other figures in the Jewish community have backed the government’s move. In a recent, JC op-ed Lord Finkelstein argued, “This country has the right to keep some sort of record of [children’s] education and ensure that their schooling meets basic secular standards.”
Hackney Council has recently voiced concern about safeguarding checks on yeshivot.
