Premier Kathleen Wynne says it is “outrageous” and “irresponsible” that a Tory MPP is undermining the publicly funded school system by advocating that parents home-school their children instead.

Progressive Conservative MPP Monte McNaughton, who fiercely oppo‎ses the Liberal government’s new sex-ed curriculum, was a speaker at an information session last week in London, Ont., on home schooling and parents’ legal rights.

“For an MPP at Queen’s Park … to be at a sort of ‘how to withdraw your kids from school’ seems pretty outrageous to me,” Wynne told the Star.

She said she knows his appearance there is connected to the Lambton-Kent-Middlesex MPP’s strong opposition to the update to the 1997 sex-ed curriculum.

“It really shines a light on the different value systems ... I believe that updating our health and education curriculum, supporting kids in our publicly funded schools to be safe, to have the information they need is very important,” she said.

RELATED:

Last spring thousands of parents gathered on the front lawn at Queen’s Park to protest the revised curriculum, saying teaching Grade 1 students the proper names for body parts, including genitalia, and same-sex relationships to Grade 3 classes, among other things, is too much too soon.

McNaughton says he was asked by the Parents Alliance of Ontario to attend the home-schooling session and denies suggesting that parents opposed to the sex-ed lesson should pull their kids out.

But he does insist that each parent knows what is best for their child.

“I stand with Ontario’s parents and support their individual choices. On matters like this, parents should be the first educator for their children,” he said in an email statement.

In June, McNaughton presented petitions to the legislature with tens of thousands of names of people opposed to the new sex-ed curriculum.

The flyer listing details of the London gathering said that “thousands of Ontario parents are worrying about the upcoming sex education” and that many are prepared to withdraw their children from the public school system and home-school them instead.

According to the Ministry of Education, only about 5,000 of the two million school-age children in Ontario are home-schooled.

‎Wynne said parents have every right to decide to educate their children at home but contends it is the role of all legislators to encourage parents to enroll their children in the public education system.

“Clearly that is not what (Tory Leader) Patrick Brown and Monte McNaughton believe ... I think it is irresponsible,” she said. “Patrick Brown has obviously condoned what Monte McNaughton is doing.”

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

Brown’s office could not be reached for comment Sunday.

McNaughton said the attack on him by the Liberals is simply cover for the fact the government is facing widespread labour unrest by teachers when school resumes in September.

‎”It’s unfortunate that the minister is using this as a smoke screen for (Education Minister Liz Sandals’) inability to make any progress on the teacher talks,” McNaughton said in the statement.

Read more about: