French government resists calls for school trip headscarf ban

Far-right politician sparks outrage by telling Muslim woman to remove hers on trip to parliament

The French government has insisted it will not seek to ban Muslim women who wear headscarves from volunteering to help on school trips after outrage when mothers accompanying pupils were told to remove theirs.

One mother said pupils were distressed and traumatised when a far-right politician told her to take off her headscarf in a regional parliament in eastern France, where she was helping out on a primary school outing for her son's class.