The school gate culture war: Decision by a gay assistant head to introduce LGBT lessons at his Birmingham primary school provoked outrage among the mostly Muslim parents. So which side needs a lesson in modern British tolerance?

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Parkfield Community School is an unprepossessing redbrick primary opposite a breaker's yard in a run-down part of Birmingham.

In bygone years, this was blue-collar 'Peaky Blinders' territory; now 99 per cent of its pupils are from Muslim families.

Mentored by teachers rated as 'outstanding' by Ofsted, the schools regulator, and guided by 'excellent' leaders, they are high-achieving children who outperform those at many other state schools.

At 9am on a weekday morning, these bright, aspirational boys and girls ought to have been be filing into morning assembly.

Parkfield Community School is an unprepossessing redbrick primary opposite a breaker's yard in a run-down part of Birmingham. Parents and pupils are pictured staging a protest outside Parkfield

As the first bell sounded a few days ago, however, I watched them join their mothers and fathers in an angry, highly orchestrated demonstration outside the gates.

They waved placards, shouted slogans and hurled insults at Andrew Moffat, their once popular and greatly respected assistant headmaster, who has been turned into a hate-figure by some parents.

Regrettably, these children, aged between four and 11, have become pawns in an ideological battle between their conservative religious parents and the liberal-minded Mr Moffat, backed by his fellow staff members.

The outrage centres on a progressive educational programme called 'No Outsiders', which Mr Moffat devised to foster tolerance and respect for everyone, regardless of their race, age, religion, disability, gender or sexual orientation.

This includes the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) communities — which makes it anathema to many Muslims, whose religion judges the practice of homosexuality to be sinful.

Yesterday the parents appeared to have gained the upper hand in the dispute. The school issued a statement saying it would suspend the lessons 'until a resolution has been reached'. The parents responded by postponing another big demonstration they planned to stage yesterday morning.

In many ways, the troubling story unfolding at Parkfield is a snapshot of the complex and divisive issues facing multicultural Britain.

Of course, both sides are convinced they represent the children's best interests.

In the education world, openly gay Mr Moffat, 47, is a heroic figure. In recognition of his crusading work on diversity and equality, he has been awarded an MBE and shortlisted for this year's Varkey Foundation Global Teacher Prize, which comes with an award of $1million (£756,000). The winner will be announced this month.

His programme aims to encourage children to celebrate sexual and gender differences from the time they first enter reception class, aged four or five.

In the education world, openly gay Mr Moffat, 47, is a heroic figure. In recognition of his crusading work on diversity and equality, he has been awarded an MBE and shortlisted for this year's Varkey Foundation Global Teacher Prize, which comes with an award of $1million (£756,000). The winner will be announced this month. Pictured Andrew Moffat school teacher at Parkfield Community

The message is reinforced by a series of lessons and 35 prescribed reading books such as And Tango Makes Three, about two male penguins that raise a chick (helped by a kindly zookeeper who gives the birds an unhatched egg) and King And King, the message of which is that even a male monarch can have a same-sex partner.

Earlier this week, Ofsted gave its backing to No Outsiders, after sending inspectors to the school to investigate. The regulator found no evidence to support the claims of a 'very small but vocal minority of parents' that the curriculum focused disproportionately on LGBT issues. It also found that the programme was not age-inappropriate.

David Williams, the head teacher, said the findings were 'great news' — but the protesters remain determined to have the lessons banned.

As the volatile demonstration I watched took place, the great majority of Parkfield pupils remained in their classrooms with their besieged teachers.

Smartly dressed in red and grey uniforms, however, others protested alongside about 200 parents, roused by the firebrand rhetoric of the main speaker, local businessman Zafar Majid, who delivered his address through amplifiers, standing on the back of a small flatbed lorry.

'The school have completely underestimated us!' he shouted, as his audience jeered and waved banners handed out by an earnest-looking young man who teaches Islamic studies (not at Parkfield, but in a local madrassa religious school). They bore slogans such as 'Education Not Indoctrination' and 'Say No to Undermining Parental Control'.

'This issue has gone national! It has gone international! Every organisation is looking at this as a test case — a psychological battleground where organisations are pitted against each other,' Mr Majid, 47, declared.

'But this is not a battle we started. We are peaceful people. We are parents. We have children we are really concerned about in regard to what's going on in the school.'

Mentored by teachers rated as 'outstanding' by Ofsted, the schools regulator, and guided by 'excellent' leaders, they are high-achieving children who outperform those at many other state schools

Branding No Outsiders 'aggressive indoctrination' and toxic, Mr Majid vowed to have it banned not just at Parkfield but 'in every school in the country'.

'Giving a positive spin and telling people it is OK for you to be Muslim and for you to be gay, Mr Moffat?' he cried. Shame! Shame! Shame!'

The pupils and parents dutifully echoed his chorus.

In fact, as Mr Majid admitted to me later, he does not have children at Parkfield. He is one of many people, some from as far away as London and Wales, who have taken up this latest cause celebre.

Last week, he shared a platform with Dr Lisa Nolland, from Seattle, who described herself as a 'sex historian' representing Anglican Mainstream, a Christian website that pronounces on matters of marriage, sexuality and family life.

Announcing that the schoolversus-mosque battle was being followed in America, she urged the protesting parents to fight their cause to the end.

'It's up to you guys!' she whooped, telling me afterwards that she was 'against the eroticisation of children' because it 'damages their healthy development'.

Mr Majid concluded the event with harsh words for the 'brainwashing' allegedly being conducted by Mr Moffat — or 'Mufti Moffat', as he was mockingly dubbed — and thanked the police for providing the protesters with 'protection'.

Given that the assistant head claims to have received menacing emails and threats, and that the school has been daubed with graffiti, some might think this ironic.

Though they daren't say it openly, not all the parents support the campaign. 'I'm not with this at all,' one young mother with two children at the school — who looked very much the modern young British Muslim, with her hijab and fashionable make-up — whispered to me through the railings.

'There are quite a few of us who think Mr Moffat is a brilliant teacher and No Outsiders is an excellent idea, but we are scared to speak out.'

Contradicting claims that parents were not consulted before the lessons were introduced, she said she had attended workshops about them, adding: 'I don't see why it shouldn't be taught here because this affects us all. I know Muslims who are gay.'

As if on cue, she was then rebuked by an older woman who had overheard her.

Some parents told me their children had been left 'frightened', 'upset' and 'confused' by the stand-off, which has been going on for more than two months.

Given that primary school pupils often regard both their teachers and their parents as role models, their sense of bewilderment is understandable.

The protest came to a head a few weeks ago, when about 600 parents kept their children away from school. Ringleaders have warned of further 'strikes' unless the lessons are stopped.

Parkfield Community School in Birmingham which has suspended lessons about diversity and LGBT issues after they triggered weekly parents' protests

Indeed, about ten children are said to have been withdrawn from school altogether, their parents preferring to teach them at home, and there has even been talk of a permanent exodus if the dispute, which is being mediated by the Department for Education, is not resolved.

Should that happen, 'it would be the school's loss because they need us to stay open', said Mohammed Hassan, 27, who has a five-year-old son in reception class. Mr Hassan was one of several protesters who prefaced their remarks with: 'I'm not homophobic, but . . .'

That this ugly clash is taking place in the area where, in 2014, Islamic hardliners were alleged to have hatched the so-called 'Trojan Horse' plot to infiltrate the governing bodies of dozens of schools and indoctrinate pupils in extremist ideology, makes it all the more disturbing.

Parkfield was not tainted by the scandal. But according to Uthmann Ahmad, 29, the madrassa teacher who handed out the placards last Thursday, a nearby primary school involved in the Trojan Horse affair has been drawn in.

It is Nansen Primary — where Christmas and Diwali celebrations were allegedly cancelled, Arabic lessons replaced French, and Islamic assemblies were substituted for Christian ones.

In a message posted on its website last November, this school said it would also be introducing the No Outsiders programme.

But Mr Ahmad, who has a ten-year-old brother at Nansen, claims the plan was scrapped after his father complained that promoting LGBT awareness was 'morally wrong' and — a familiar refrain — not 'age-appropriate' for primary school children.

Invited to comment on this claim, Nansen Primary did not respond.

This issue is being further muddied by claims, led by an influential Islamic blogger, that Mr Moffat's educational programme — which draws on the 2010 Equality Act and the 'Fundamental British Values' set out in the Home Office's much-criticised 'Prevent' anti-radicalisation strategy — is part of an Establishment-driven scheme intended to undermine the faith of young Muslims.

It is all fomenting an atmosphere of mistrust in this already sensitive neighbourhood, and the children, whose education is suffering, are caught in the middle. How has it come to this?

Under current law, primary schools are not required to teach LGBT issues at all. But the Department for Education encourages them to do so if they consider it appropriate, and in 2020, under new legislation, 'relationship education' in all its aspects will become a statutory requirement.

Inspired by his personal experience, Mr Moffat has been zealously pioneering the cause for many years. In a profile article, he revealed how he began to realise he was different from other boys at six, because he didn't like football and his friends were mainly girls.

At 13, he was attacked by a gang because he liked the pop group Wham!, fronted by George Michael, whose homosexuality at the time was becoming apparent.

By 16 he knew he was gay, but he didn't come out for a further decade. For in the Eighties, when he was a teenager, Margaret Thatcher had introduced the now-repealed Section 28 law, banning local authority schools from promoting 'the acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship', and homophobia was rife.

It was a frivolous and somewhat bizarre story that carried Mr Moffat into the spotlight. As he and his partner make frequent trips to Sweden — and particularly enjoy attending heats of the Eurovision Song Contest there — they chose a Swedish theme for their civil partnership ceremony in 2006.

They wore matching cravats in yellow and blue, the colours of the Swedish flag, played music by Abba, and the hotel even drafted in a Swedish barman. 'Couple Murmur Swede Nothings' was the headline in the Birmingham Post.

Eight years later, however, a more serious matter put Mr Moffat back in the news.

He was teaching at the Chilwell Croft Academy primary school in Birmingham, where he introduced the first version of his self-invented equality and diversity curriculum — and courageously came out before the entire school during an assembly.

It all resulted in a protest by parents, Christian as well as Muslim, and when the school asked him to apologise and withdraw the textbooks he used, he resigned.

Less resilient characters might have abandoned the mission. Either that or taken up a post in a liberal-leaning area where most parents might embrace his teaching philosophy.

Yet by taking an assistant headship at Parkfield in 2014, he deliberately leapt from frying pan to fire, for, as he has explained in an interview with The Guardian: 'There was no point in going to an area where it would be an easy task.

'I had to go where I might meet the same challenges, in order to find a different way to meet them. I was determined to make LGBT equality a reality in any community. I could not afford to get it wrong a second time.'

As the first bell sounded a few days ago, however, I watched them join their mothers and fathers in an angry, highly orchestrated demonstration outside the gates

Separately, he said: 'Children need to know from an early age that all families are different. Some have a mum and a dad, some just have a mum, or just a dad. Some have two mums or two dads.'

Many parents will applaud his views. Others, whatever their religious beliefs, will doubtless think it questionable that the minds of four-year-old children should be dealing with questions of sexual orientation and gender.

Certainly, his zestful teaching of LGBT issues will not be to everyone's taste.

For example, after 49 people were massacred and 53 wounded at a gay nightclub in Florida in 2016 by a gunman who pledged his allegiance to IS, Mr Moffat showed pupils aged nine and ten photographs of people queueing to give blood.

The donors' desire to help those of a different sexual orientation, he said, perfectly illustrated his 'no outsiders' principle.

His programme has been taken up by several other schools in the Midlands and beyond, however, and has won approval from the education authorities.

Expressing support for Parkfield's stance a few days ago, Ofsted chief Amanda Spielman said schools should teach children they can have 'two mummies' or 'two daddies'; and that they are not 'bad or ill' because they don't 'fit into a conventional pattern'.

The essence of democracy, Ms Spielman added, was that people didn't always get their own way, but accepted the majority decision.

One curious aspect of this affair is that, for four years, parents at Parkfield appeared to accept Mr Moffat's revised teaching programme, which he set out in a £29 textbook and launched at the school on his appointment.

No one complained until last autumn, when mothers began voicing concerns at a coffee morning. Among them was Mariam Ahmed, whose four-year-old daughter, Annayah, began attending the school in September.

'She was coming home saying, 'I can wear a boy's clothes . . . I can have a boy's name',' Mrs Ahmed, now a driving force behind the campaign, told me.

'Then I started hearing similar stories from other parents and I realised this was more alarming than I'd thought. Their kids had been saying 'Mr Moffat says it's OK to be gay', and vice-versa sex is no problem.'

'We aren't against Mr Moffat. He is homosexual himself, and that's absolutely fine. And as a teacher he's great. What we do not agree with is his No Outsiders book.'

However, Mrs Ahmed made a catalogue of allegations against the assistant head and the school, saying, for example, that her children and those of other prominent campaigners were being 'victimised', and accusing Mr Moffat of lying when he said he has received 'nasty emails' and threats. She further claimed he has put up a poster featuring 'only gay celebrities', but no straight ones, in the school.

And she maintained that the teaching programme was ushered in 'under the radar' without parental consultation, even stating that no one knew anything about it until the children began coming home with their stories a few months ago — a strange suggestion, given the media attention it has attracted from its inception.

The school said its No Outsiders project - which teaches tolerance of diverse groups, including those of different races, genders and sexual orientation - will not be taught 'until a resolution has been reached'

The school declined to comment on these claims, saying only that it would 'work together with parents, the Department for Education and others involved to find a way forward'.

The DfE said: 'Parkfield is an outstanding school with a leadership team and staff committed to making sure pupils receive the best education. We trust head teachers to make decisions about what is appropriate for their pupils to be taught and to consult parents on the context of sensitive subjects.

'All schools should promote the fundamental British values . . . we are working with the school and its parents to find a solution.'

How, then, might this very modern imbroglio be resolved?

Last night, it seemed the progressive educationalists and reactionary parents were inching towards a compromise, despite their very different views.

For the sake of the children, we must hope so, for they are suffering the consequences of this struggle for ideological supremacy.

Additional reporting: AMARDEEP BASSEY