The UK Government has announced plans to replace Circular 1/94, its thirty-two-year-old guidance on collective worship in England, and publish updated advice on its collective worship requirements later this year. Humanists UK, which campaigns for reform of collective worship laws, welcomes the announcement, but says that the move does not go far enough, and only a complete repeal of collective worship would address the issues raised in the wake of the Supreme Court ruling on JR87.
Responding to an amendment seeking to replace collective worship with inclusive assemblies in schools of no religious character during a House of Lord debate on the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill on 3 February, Education Minister Baroness Smith told peers that the Government was ‘committed’ to collective worship in schools. However, the Minister also confirmed that the Department for Education planned to publish updated guidance on collective worship in England ‘to make expectations clear, including objective, pluralistic and critical delivery to give schools practical support.’
In November 2025 the Supreme Court, in a case known as JR87, found that teaching Religious Education (RE) in an exclusively Christian manner was ‘indoctrination’, and recognised that relying on parental right of withdrawal from collective worship was inadequate in practice, and risked stigmatisation for children. In England, a daily act of collective worship in a ‘broadly Christian character’ is required to be carried out in all schools. Humanists UK argues that it is impossible for mandatory worship, in one religion no less, to be objective, critical, and pluralistic. It has previously called on the UK Government to carry out an urgent review of collective worship laws following the JR87 ruling.
Collective worship requirements are unpopular with school leaders and teachers. A 2024 Teacher Tapp poll found that 70% of school leaders opposed the current law mandating schools to hold a daily act of collective Christian worship. In response to the poll, the then general secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT), Paul Whiteman, called for the requirement to hold collective worship to be ‘removed’, with General Secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, Pepe di’Lasio, describing it as ‘increasingly anachronistic’. NAHT also called for the replacement of collective worship with a more inclusive approach as part of its submission to the Curriculum and Assessment review’s call for evidence. This was similar to Humanists UK’s own submission, although collective worship was ultimately ruled out of scope.
Circular 1/94 is one of the oldest pieces of guidance from a UK ministerial department still in force and has been used for decades to require all state-funded schools to hold a daily act of worship of a ‘broadly Christian character’. It has been the focus of revision over the years, first in 2008 when the RE element of the circular was replaced by the 2010 non-statutory guidance on RE, and then in 2012 when the UK Government announced that Circular 1/94 did not represent its official advice on the matter of collective worship. Despite this, the guidance was not withdrawn and remained as ‘current’ on its website.
Humanists UK’s Policy and Campaigns Manager, Lewis Young, said:
‘Updating the guidance on collective worship is an overdue admission that something written in 1994 cannot realistically be used to defend compulsory Christian worship in today’s schools. However, the law still requires schools to carry out collective worship as part of the school day, and children either have to take part or risk stigmatisation or exclusion by being withdrawn.
‘Issuing new guidance is therefore not the end of the matter, and nor does it address the fact that compulsory Christian collective worship cannot really be pluralistic, objective, and critical. The UK Government should review and reform the law on collective worship so that every child, regardless of their faith or belief, can take part in assemblies that are genuinely inclusive and befitting our modern society.’
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For further comment or information, media should contact Humanists UK Head of Press and Campaign Communications Nathan Stilwell at press@humanists.uk or phone 0203 675 0959 (media only).
GOV.UK provides guidance and regulation by date of publication. After various nautical charts, other historic documents, and international treaties, the first bit of extant guidance from a ministerial department appears to be Circular 1/94 (at the bottom of page 3). The Building Regulations 1991: caravans and mobile homes – Divisional circular letter dated 13 January 1993, clarifying the Department of Environment circular 13/92 and Welsh circular 29/92 – relates to two withdrawn circulars and is therefore presumably defunct itself. There are ‘Transport Advisory Leaflets’ dating from 1989, which are most likely the oldest pieces of guidance from any ministerial department.
Read more about our work on collective worship.
Read our story on the JR87 Supreme Court ruling.
Read the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill Report Stage debate.
Read our story on the need for an urgent review of collective worship in England following the JR87 ruling.
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