1The following section shall be substituted for section 26 of the 1944 Act—
“26 Special provisions as to religious education in county schools.
“26(1)In the case of a county school the provision for religious education for pupils at the school which is required by section 2(1)(a) of the Education Reform Act 1988 to be included in the school’s basic curriculum shall be provision for religious education in accordance with an agreed syllabus adopted for the school or for those pupils.
(2)No such syllabus shall provide for religious education to be given to pupils at such a school by means of any catechism or formulary which is distinctive of any particular religious denomination; but this provision is not to be taken as prohibiting provision in such a syllabus for the study of such catechisms or formularies.
(3)Subsection (4) below applies where a county secondary school is so situated that arrangements cannot conveniently be made for the withdrawal of pupils from the school in accordance with section 9 of that Act to receive religious education elsewhere.
(4)If in any such case the local education authority are satisfied—
(a)that the parents of pupils in attendance at the school desire them to receive religious education in the school in accordance with the tenets of a particular religious denomination; and
(b)that satisfactory arrangements have been made for the provision of such education to those pupils in the school, and for securing that the cost of providing such education to those pupils in the school will not fall upon the authority;
the authority shall, unless they are satisfied that owing to any special circumstances it would be unreasonable to do so, provide facilities for the carrying out of those arrangements.”