Sex talk

Despite all the recent talk about unwanted pregnancies and abortion in Australia, the fiercest opponents of abortion seem to be missing the point.

It is all well and good to provide $51 million for pregnancy counselling services (assuming it is delivered in a professional unbiased manner) but it won’t do anything to stop unplanned pregnancies.

It also won’t do anything to stop the spread of sexually transmitted infections, including HIV, or reduce the frighteningly high rate of sexual assault. Nor will it fight homophobia or help young people decide if and when they will be sexually active.

Keeping young people in the dark or suggesting that they just say "No" is also no answer - it never was, never will be.

But comprehensive evidence-based relationships and sexual and reproductive health education in our schools with parents involved and teachers properly equipped to deliver it, must surely help.

Of course there will be resistance. There are still those who argue that sex education encourages early sexual behaviour, promiscuity and homosexuality, despite all the evidence to the contrary.

In South Australia in 2003, when 15 schools began to try out a sexual health and relationship education program based on five years of research that drew on best practice in overseas countries, the Religious Right went to town with misinformation and intimidation.

An inquiry into sex education would tell us what information our young people are (or are not) receiving, would counter baseless claims against sex education and even allow young people to speak for themselves about what they need and want to know.