A BBC sex education video branded “like a blue movie” has sparked outrage after it was shown to school children as young as nine.
Materials include a graphic sex scene of a computer-generated couple, cartoon characters having sex, and explicit discussion.
The Government’s education minister Nick Gibb has now pledged to investigate the matter.
Innocence
The Sex and Relationship Education video produced by BBC Active, which is aimed at nine to eleven-year-olds, has been described by a Conservative MP as “shattering the innocence of childhood”.
Andrea Leadsom, who represents South Northamptonshire, said she had been contacted by horrified parents whose children had seen the film.
She said: “Many of us will get a letter from the school saying, ‘Your child will be shown a BBC sex education DVD’ and we think, ‘It must be all right – it’s the Beeb’.
“But this material is explicit. It is shattering the innocence of childhood”.
Suitability
But a BBC Active spokesman said all of their resources provide “clear guidance on age suitability” and that they allow teachers to “pick and choose the elements they feel are appropriate”.
In October Mrs Leadsom called for sex education resources to be scrutinised by the British Board of Film Classification before they are bought by schools and local authorities to ensure children are protected from “extraordinarily inappropriate” content.
Explicit
Last year The Christian Institute released a report revealing explicit resources being recommended for use in primary schools that choose to teach sex education.
One of the suggested resources is a card game where five-year-olds could be asked to match sexually explicit terms, such as masturbation and anal sex, with definitions.