What do I think about SOGI and parental involvement in schools? by Kevin Falcon, Leader, BC United Party, September 21, 2023

On Sept 21, at 754 p.m., BC United leader POSTED on X a video of an exchange between him and a reporter in front of a BC UNITED Caucus banner. The video is undated but based on comments by the reporter and Falcon, this exchange can be dated to September 21, 2023.

The video runs for 4:19 seconds and it contains captions of what was said by the reporter and Falcon. See Kevin Falcon’s X post below:

And here is a transcript of that exchange between Kevin Falcon and the reporter:

Reporter: Hi Kevin. So earlier this week Katie DeRosa asked you a question about whether your government would consider putting policies similar to what we just recently seen [sic] in Saskatchewan around sex education and especially around getting parental consent if a student is using a different name or changing their pronouns. So, specifically, on that piece of getting parental consent or changing pronouns or using different name – what is your party’s stance on that?

Falcon: Well, I’m not gonna answer this specific question, I’ll tell you. It’s not because I’m being evasive. It’s because it’s only one example of multitudes of examples that parents can give you of issues they may have concerns about. And so whenever you have a challenge like this, I think it’s important we unite people and bring people together number one. Number two: I’m a dad. I’ve got two young daughters; they’re all at school; and they, you know, as every other parent, we are, want to know what’s happening in the classroom. For sure.

And so we operate from these fundamental principles: 1) transparency. Parents have a right to know what’s going on in the classroom. 2) parental involvement. You don’t want to push parents out of the system. That breeds distrust, and parents – whether we like them or not, and whether we think they’re always right or not, they are the parents of their kids, and fundamentally parents have a right to know what’s happening with their children; and 3) age appropriateness. That’s most of what I hear from parents. They’re so reasonable! You know, people recognize we have to protect vulnerable children, and we will. That’s why you will never see me allow children – vulnerable kids especially – to be used as a punching bag in politics. Not gonna happen. But I can tell you, I’m not gonna also reject the parents that have legitimate concerns, that they don’t feel like they’ve got a line of sight of what’s going on in their own classrooms. They have that right too.

So, the answer to your question is: let’s establish the fundamental principles first, which I just outlined, and secondly, let’s bring parents together – and teachers – and make sure that that issue, and many others, that we can sit down and have a conversation, like reasonable people, and get to a place that makes most people happy. And the example I gave the other day of sex education was to point out that that’s a progam we brought in place way back in the early 2000s. It’s still in place today. But it was important because it said to parents, “we know some of you have concern about sensitive subjects, so we let you know in advance this is what will be discussed next week, and here’s the list of it, and you have the option if you have concerns, to contact the teacher, or, if necessary, to pull the child and you can talk to the child on your own.” And it’s not a perfect solution, but it’s worked pretty well for 20 years, and I think the complaint I hear from this government is their approach is: “just keep parents right out of it. They don’t know what’s best for the kids – WE DO” and I’ll tell you, it doesn’t play well with parents.

REPORTER: Ok so yesterday at the protest and counter-protests, I heard anti-Semitic slurs being hurled, I saw COVID-era conspiracy theories that … become popular, I saw sex education included with pedophilia, and grooming. So are you concerned about the kind of hateful messages that have latched (?) on to this?

Falcon: Yes, because, again, I want to unite people together, especially over sensitive subjects like this. It is very easy to get a crowd whipped up – I get that – but, and people say terribly irresponsible things and I condemn that totally, and that’s why we issued that statement yesterday making it very clear where we stand. Remember – and I wanna remind everyone of this – that I wasn’t even in government in 2015, but I’m proud that the government introduced that program called SOGI. It was a government by the way in a cabinet that had John Rustad, a former colleague of mine, and Mike Bernier, a current colleague of mine, and the decision they made back then was that parents should have – sorry teachers should have a module that helps them ensure that there’s anti-bullying and anti-harassment modules to help them deal with vulnerable children that may be at threat or risk of being bullied or harassed. That’s the right thing to do. It was then; it is today.

Now, what happens is there is a lot of misinformation that gets out there; there’s a lot of stuff that happens in the US that bleeds over into Canada. There’s a lot of people that, you know, conflate it with all these other crazy conspiracy theories and everything else that you just mentioned – that’s totally inappropriate. But, as I say, we cannot as responsible parents that love our kids and wanna make sure we protect vulnerable kids also just say that you as parents don’t have any, any right or any ability to have a sense of what’s going on in the school. [I] don’t believe that’s right either.