Ireland’s Journey: “Why didn’t we do this years ago?”
In 2015, Ireland became the 47th country to prohibit all corporal punishment of children through abolishing the common law defence of ‘reasonable chastisement’. At the time, I was an independent member of Seanad Éireann, (upper house of the Irish parliament). It was the proudest achievement of my term as a Senator to have championed and secured the effective ban on the physical punishment of children in Ireland.
It was the proudest achievement of my term as a Senator to have championed and secured the effective ban on the physical punishment of children in Ireland.
The legal defence of ‘reasonable chastisement’ is not an Irish invention; it came to us from English common law. Through its colonial past, England has been responsible for rooting this defence in over 70 countries and territories worldwide.
The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child had twice, in 1998 and 2006, recommended that Ireland explicitly prohibit corporal punishment in the family.
The Council of Europe's European Committee of Social Rights had twice found Ireland to be in violation of article17 of the Revised Social Charter because corporal punishment was not prohibited in all settings.
The Special Rapporteur on Child Protection, then Geoffrey Shannon repeatedly called for a repeal of the defence of reasonable chastisement.
In November 2012, the Irish people voted to enshrine protection for children as individual rights holders in the Irish Constitution. After a failed Supreme Court appeal, the law was signed in April 2015.
However, there remained an overriding belief among politicians, the Government and even some children's organisations that Ireland was not ready to ban corporal punishment – that we needed full public support before we could change the law for children. Children had to sit in the corner and wait. In my view, the longer we waited, the more children would be harmed.
In September 2015, I proposed an amendment to the Government's Children First Bill on child protection. The amendment aimed to repeal the defence of reasonable chastisement. A lot of work was done behind the scenes, and the amended Bill was signed into law by the President in December 2015. The moment the law changed, it had an immediate and significant impact. I received numerous messages from colleagues and others who had initially urged caution, asking, "Why didn't we do this years ago?"
The moment the law changed, it had an immediate and significant impact. I received numerous messages from colleagues and others who had initially urged caution, asking, "Why didn't we do this years ago?"
Why do we as a society accept that we even discuss if and when it is okay to hit someone? Let alone when that someone is smaller than us and probably doesn't understand why they are being hit? When we debate the issue of corporal punishment, violence against children or so-called ‘slapping’, you can almost feel an invisible line appear in people's heads about their tolerance level. They say, "you know I am only talking about a tap, not a thump, a slap, not a belt, a smack, not a whack". And, of course, this issue is wrapped up in how we were raised—all too often, the knee-jerk reaction "it never did me any harm" is heard. I would add, "It never did you any good either!"
This invisible line is highly subjective and it leaves children vulnerable. When someone hits a child, it is not from a rational place. The decision is made in a heightened emotional state when we are stressed, tired and, let's face it, least able to engage in sound and reasoned judgement. The invisible line gets blurred. In extreme cases, it gets rubbed out completely. One way or the other, the existence of the invisible line means children are all too often exposed to an escalation of violence.
The excuse "I got a terrible fright when she ran out on the road and so I just hit her to show how wrong it is" is used in relation to children. We all get frights in our life, but my first reaction is not to hit someone – so why do we culturally accept that it is okay when it is a child? One caller to a radio station summed it up by saying "my Grandmother has dementia, and she is likely to walk out into traffic or harm herself. Should I use that as a reason to slap her?"
By abolishing the defence of reasonable chastisement, Ireland ensured that all citizens are equal in the eyes of the law. It brought clarity, in the words of a social worker, "it took the 'that's the way I was raised' argument off the table".
When we think of home, we think of comfort and safety. Yet, in many countries, the law can allow for violence against children in their own homes. For any country considering a similar change in the law, the time is now. Children deserve action now to ensure they can grow up free from violence.
For any country considering a similar change in the law, the time is now. Children deserve action now to ensure they can grow up free from violence.
Jillian van Turnhout
Former Senator, Ireland
* An article on Ireland’s journey can be found in the Canadian Journal of Children’s Rights https://ojs.library.carleton.ca/index.php/cjcr/article/view/4278
- See our other 2024 Guest Blogs
- Read the End Corporal Punishment country report for Ireland.
- Find out about measures to put legal prohibition of corporal punishment into effect.
- Learn more about progress in ending corporal punishment in Europe and Central Asia
