SOUTHAMPTON councillors have agreed that God should be kept out of the science classroom.

They backed a motion demanding science and religion should continue to be taught separately.

It comes as 70 Hampshire secondary schools have been issued advice on how to teach 11 to 14-year-olds creationism alongside Darwin’s theory of evolution.

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Hampshire County Council’s multifaith advisory panel for religious education backed guidance which suggests they could be debated as in both science and RE lessons as part of a joint syllabus.

Southampton councillors agreed to send a message to the city’s own RE advisory panel, as well as school governors, that the two should not be mixed. Lib Dem group leader councillor Jill Baston, who proposed the debate, said she was “hoisting a warning flag”.

She said: “It’s important to know about world religions. But science and religion need to be kept separate.”

Councillor Parvin Damani, chairman of Southampton’s Standing Advisory Council for Religious Education, said she believed in the “theory of Adam and Eve”.

But she promised teachers would be involved in the debate when her panel considered it and that it was important not to “undermine people’s intelligence”.