Imagine being a teacher who loses her job for answering a pupil’s question honestly. Welcome to the brave new world of British education. Anita Meston, a 63-year-old Christian teacher with 28 years’ experience, is taking legal action against Biddick Academy in Sunderland after her contract was terminated in March 2025. Her alleged offence? Expressing her pro-life convictions when a pupil asked whether she was ‘pro-abortion’.
According to Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), which is supporting her case, Meston explained that she was pro-life because she was a Christian and knew women who had regretted having abortions. When another pupil said she knew women who had not regretted theirs, Meston reportedly replied, ‘Fair enough’.
No lecture. No attempt to force her beliefs on anyone. Just an answer to a question, followed by an acknowledgement that others saw things differently. Yet, according to ADF, the following day Meston was told by the headteacher that she could not give her personal views in the classroom and that her contract would be terminated. It had been renewed the previous week.
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