VFE,
Just because it's not required, doesn't mean it's not useful!
My club required me to do a "cross-channel checkout" before taking their aircraft to France. So I booked a PA28 and an instructor for a day. When the day came, the weather between my home airfield and the coast was solid IMC. I don't have an IMC rating, so I was ready to cancel, but my instructor suggested we go on her IMC rating as long as I was happy. The forecast in France was VFR, so an IR wasn't necessary.
While in IMC, I flew the plane, my instructor navigated. Although the workload was very high, I was quite happy flying straight+level, making small turns and tracking VOR radials on the instruments. There was only one point when I inadvertently entered an unusual attitude - that was when I looked down at my knee-board to check out some morse code in order to ident a VOR.
Of course an IMC or IR rated pilot would be far more competent than me at flying on instruments, and would be able to maitain control whilst performing other tasks. But the fact is that if I'd known morse code, I wouldn't have departed from straight+level.
So no, not required - but I plan on learning morse when I do my IMC rating because I believe it's a useful tool to have.
FFF
---------