Faith schools in England will no longer have to offer up to half of their places to children who don’t belong to their religion, under changes to state school admissions rules announced by the government.
Currently, new faith schools can only fill a maximum of 50% of their places using faith-based admissions criteria, but the change announced by the education secretary, Gillian Keegan, will allow them to turn away other children.
The consultation opened by the government on Wednesday would also allow churches and religious groups to open faith schools for children with special educational needs, which campaigners warned could raise ethical concerns.
Proposals to scrap the 50% cap – which only applies when schools have more applicants than places – are opposed by Rowan Williams, the former archbishop of Canterbury, and artists including Philip Pullman and Ian McEwan, on the grounds that it would be divisive and likely to penalise disadvantaged children by denying them access to local schools.
Andrew Copson, the chief executive of Humanists UK, said: “The proposal to allow 100% religious discrimination in new state faith schools will increase religious and racial segregation in our schools at a time when integration and cohesion has never been more important.
“It will further disadvantage poorer families, non-religious families, and families of the ‘wrong’ religion.
“Rather than expanding religious selection, a government that cared about cohesion would be seeking to create a single admissions system where all state schools are open to children from any background or belief.”
But supporters including Ruth Kelly, the former Labour education secretary under Tony Blair, celebrated the announcement as a victory for the Catholic church, which was unwilling to open new schools under the restriction and lobbied ministers to abolish the cap.
Kelly, a vice-president of the Catholic Union, said: “I’m delighted that the education secretary has taken this decision. The Catholic church is one of the oldest providers of education in this country, and Catholic schools consistently produce higher than average results. The fact that Catholic free schools were prevented from opening never made sense.
“This decision is well earned recognition of the success of our schools and a vote of confidence in Catholic education in general.”
Keegan, who attended Catholic primary and secondary schools, said: “Faith groups run some of the best schools in the country, including in some of the most disadvantaged areas, and it’s absolutely right we support them to unleash that potential even further – including through the creation of the first ever faith academies for children with special educational needs.”
Stephen Evans, the chief executive of the National Secular Society, said the move was “entirely wrongheaded,” and that his group was particularly worried by religious groups running more special schools.
“The creation of ‘special faith-based academies’ raises ethical issues concerning the imposition of religion on children with special educational needs and disabilities [Send]. We will be keen to ensure that Send provision is not used to expose vulnerable children to religious proselytising,” Evans said.
Nigel Genders, the Church of England’s chief education officer, said: “By enabling Church of England special schools, we can serve the needs of more children in more communities, irrespective of their faith background.”
The cap was applied in 2010 to new schools launched as part of the government’s free school programme, to address concerns that churches and religious groups would create a new wave of faith schools.
Of the 20,000 mainstream state schools in England, more than 4,500 are Church of England faith schools, 1,955 Catholic faith schools and 139 of other Christian faiths. There are only 34 Islamic faith schools, with 50 Jewish, 12 Sikh and two Hindu faith schools.
Paul Whiteman, the general secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers, said the decision could lead to selection “by the backdoor” and make it harder for pupils to get places at their local school.
“Such a change in policy feels inappropriate so close to an election and is something that should be incorporated into a manifesto,” Whiteman said.
