Yesterday, 05 March 2018, Minister for School Standards Nick Gibb rejected the petition to have BSL as part of the national curriculum. He also rejected the creation of a GCSE qualification in British Sign Language.
Not allowing deaf students to gain a GCSE, contribute to league tables and gain a qualification that is recognisable to employers shows an absolute lack of equality for young people who use BSL as a first language.
This is not the first time we have been presented with hurdles in our quest to provide a GCSE in BSL. We will continue the work required to prepare this qualification, but to do this we need assurance that the Department for Education and Ofqual will allow and support us to do that.
We will continue to educate the appropriate government departments on the importance of this qualification.
We want to thank Wayne Barrow sincerely for his hard work and passion in bringing this important debate to Parliament.