Samantha Niblett launches summer of sex campaign for better sex education

Samantha Niblett launched her "Yes Sex Please, We're British!" campaign as the Labour MP for South Derbyshire stepped up an effort to push sex education into Westminster’s political mainstream. The campaign is built around consent, respect and healthy relationships, and Niblett said its purpose was to prevent abuse and violence.

Niblett has partnered with Cindy Gallop, the founder of MakeLoveNotPorn, in a bid to steer people away from pornography and toward more open conversations about sex and relationships. Gallop called the launch a "historic day" on LinkedIn and said she and Niblett were launching a national campaign to get the whole of Britain talking about sex education and the issues around it.

The political messaging has been as provocative as the policy pitch. Niblett said she wanted to make 2026 the "summer of sex", a line that has drawn attention well beyond the substance of the campaign and fed the kind of "sex MP" shorthand that can easily overshadow the public-health case. That tension matters because the campaign’s stated goals are measurable and practical: better consent education, more inclusive teaching and, ultimately, fewer abusive or violent relationships.

The campaign has also been tied to plans for a tour and an exhibition-style display, including bringing sex toys into Parliament to encourage a more open and inclusive conversation. That kind of visual branding is designed to grab headlines, but it also risks turning a debate about access to age-appropriate sex education into a culture-war sideshow.

Niblett has already secured a House of Commons debate on the issue, with Bi Community News saying a chamber discussion on lifelong sex education was likely to take place in early autumn. The debate gives the campaign a route from social media theatrics into legislative scrutiny, where the sharper test will be whether MPs are willing to discuss gaps in consent education, the need for lifelong learning and the reach of services that support sexual health.

The campaign has not gone unchallenged. The Christian Institute described it as a pornographic "summer of sex" campaign, a criticism that underlines how quickly a public-health message can become a political flashpoint. Supporters, by contrast, have framed the launch as overdue recognition that sex education in Britain needs to be more candid, more inclusive and less afraid of the subject it claims to teach.