Parents slapping children ‘in breach of human rights’

PARENTS and guardians who slap their children are breaching their youngsters’ human rights, a hearing in Europe has decided.

The European Committee on Social Rights ruled Ireland was in violation of human rights protections by not bringing in laws to expressly outlaw all physical punishment of children.

The Strasbourg-based committee will demand the Government take action by introducing legislation which would govern the behaviour of parents and guardians both in public and in their own homes. The Department of Justice is examining the ruling.

The committee, which operates under the Council of Europe, found Ireland was in breach of Article 17 of the European Social Charter which requires a prohibition in law against any form of violence against children, whether at school, in other institutions, in their home or elsewhere.

Ireland has been a signatory to the charter since the 1960s but the organisation which took the case to the committee, France-based World Organisation Against Torture, argued Irish domestic laws did not give effect to Article 17.

Ireland has outlawed corporal punishment in schools, crèches and detention centres, but children at home, in foster care, in residential care or in the care of informal childminders have no such protection.

In a submission to the committee, the Government argued guidelines for foster parents, childminders and residential care staff reject physical punishment as a way of chastising children.

In its ruling, however, the committee noted these guidelines do not have the force of law.

The Irish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (ISPCC) said last night the ruling should give the Government the impetus to bring in a full legal ban on slapping along with an education programme for “positive parenting”.

ISPCC chief executive Paul Gilligan said: “Most parents do not use slapping and would welcome a legal reinforcement of that position.”