RELIGIOUS education (RE) could “dwindle and die” in schools, Bournemouth’s town centre rector has warned.

The subject is being excluded from the core subjects which will form part of the English Baccalaureate (Ebacc), a measure of pupils’ success in five key areas.

The Rev Ian Terry is among those lobbying the government to reconsider and include RE among the core subjects.

“The needs of each child and young person must be paramount in all educational decisions, and this ignores their spiritual development, with its wide variety of religious implications,” he said.

He was concerned that schools would not receive funding to teach RE if it was not available as a public exam and that the subject would lose the respect of pupils, parents and teachers.

“Even fewer will train to teach this subject as specialists. The subject will dwindle and die. Future generations will be very badly served by this lack of well-grounded RE teaching,” he said.

Dr Terry, who is a visiting fellow with Bournemouth University, added: “This subject contributes hugely to community cohesion and to the understanding of democratic values, and how we deal creatively with difference.

“At a time when British values are being promoted in schools to counter fundamentalist attitudes, it is inconsistent and inappropriate to remove from the range of examination possibilities religious education with its explicit commitment to assisting pupils gain an educated understanding of those of different cultures, beliefs and ideologies with whom we must learn to peaceably share our world.”

The English Baccalaureate was introduced as a school performance measure in 2010, allowing people to see how many pupils received a grade C or above in core academic subjects at key stage four in any government-funded school.

This year, the government announced that all pupils who start year seven this September will take the Ebacc subjects at GCSE in 2020, and the government is consulting on detailed proposals.

All children have to study RE up to year 11, but they do not have to take an exam in it.

Former education secretary Michael Gove said, when introducing the Ebacc, that RE was already a compulsory subject and that he intended to encourage wider take-up of geography and history, where numbers were declining.

The Church of England’s chief education officer, the Rev Nigel Genders, has also criticised the government’s stance, saying the compulsory Ebacc will lead to a decline in the popularity of RE and some other subjects at GCSE.