ABSTRACT
The Religious Education (RE) Council wants to gain control of religious education in the first instance from local agreed syllabus committees and secondly, from the Department of Education, which will then fulfil the minor role of funding and presumably servicing the new RE Council appointed ‘national body of experts’. For the most part, critical debates that characterise other disciplines and fields of study are largely absent from religious education, yet it is through such debates that genuine progress can be made. There is a range of factors that inhibit debate in British religious education, particularly debate and criticism of policy and theory. The problem of expertise in religious education is particularly acute, as there are so few who are qualified and have the necessary experience to be regarded as experts. The chapter also presents some closing thoughts on the key concepts discussed in the preceding chapters of this book.
