A second Australian state has legalised voluntary assisted dying for terminally ill adults living in pain after what the health minister described as a ‘significant moment’ for the typically conservative state. The lower house in Western Australia yesterday approved the Labor Government’s Bill which will allow terminally ill Western Australians the right to end their […]

Humanists UK is urging its supporters to ask their election candidates where they stand on humanist issues including assisted dying, humanist marriage, inclusive education, religious discrimination in schools, and other issues ahead of the general election on 12 December. It has published tables comparing the major parties’ policies in Great Britain and Northern Ireland on […]

Northern Ireland Humanists is encouraging its members and supporters to respond to a UK Government consultation on new regulations for abortion in Northern Ireland, which will come into force next year. The consultation closes on 16 December.  Abortion was legalised in Northern Ireland on 22 October, and from 31 March 2020, abortion will be available […]

Humanists UK is pleased to announce the appointment of three new patrons from the fields of science education, music, and the arts. They are Sally Le Page, popular evolutionary biologist and YouTuber; Hannah Peel, artist, producer, and composer; and well known comedian, writer and podcaster, Catie Wilkins. Sally Le Page is an evolutionary biologist and […]

Humanists UK is deeply sad to report the death of its patron, the author and polymath Sir Jonathan Miller CBE. Sir Jonathan Miller was born into a Jewish family in 1934 and grew up in Hampstead. He studied natural sciences and medicine at St John’s College, Cambridge and University College London, graduating in 1959. He […]

Humanists UK has published a guide for parents including a template letter to schools on how to request a meaningful alternative to collective worship if they have concerns about their children taking part. After the success of the recent case of Lee and Lizanne Harris who won in their bid to have their school provide […]

Humanists UK has today welcomed the High Court’s decision to uphold an injuction which permanently prohibits anti-LGBT protesters from holding intimidating rallies near Anderton Park Primary School in Birmingham. The High Court in Birmingham today ruled that a temporary injunction placing an ‘exclusion zone’ around Anderton Park Primary School should be made permanent. The injunction […]

Robert Peston, journalist, broadcaster, and Political Editor at ITV News delivered the Holyoake Lecture 2019 to an audience of over 300 in central Manchester on Thursday 21 November. No politician was spared criticism in a fast-moving and wide-ranging lecture on ‘Mending a fractured society’ – or ‘Humpty Dumpty Britain’. Peston argued that though economies have […]

The Roman Catholic diocese proposing a Catholic school that, if approved, will be the first of a wave of religiously selective voluntary aided (VA) faith schools, has said that one-fifth of its places will be ‘allocated on the basis of distance rather than faith’. This is in spite of the claim often made by the […]

Parents Lee and Lizanne Harris successfully challenge compulsory collective worship in school assembly on human rights grounds In a shock climbdown, Oxford Diocesan Schools Trust agrees to provide a meaningful alternative assembly of equal educational worth for all pupils withdrawn from compulsory prayers School will no longer hold its school leavers’ ceremony in church or […]