Corporal Punishment
What is corporal punishment? Corporal punishment refers to the use of physical punishment to correct behaviour. The term derives from the Latin corpus, meaning body.
As an officially administered or sanctioned method of enforcing discipline, corporal punishment is in virtually terminal decline. Despite persistent enthusiasm for physical chastisement in significant sections of the population, social scientists are virtually unanimous in arguing that corporal punishment has more negative than positive effects.
BackgroundThe infliction of physical pain as an official means of punishment is as old as human history.
In the UK's schools and prisons, until relatively recently, physical punishment was perceived as part of the educative and disciplinary process, and was often viewed as 'character building'.
Although the various methods of corporal punishment were steadily outlawed throughout the 20th Century - the use of the birch in schools was famously abolished in 1948 - it was not until after the 1967 Plowden report, 'Children and their Primary Schools', that the abolition of corporal punishment in state schools was treated as a major issue, and in 1986 it was outlawed altogether.
It was not until 1998 that corporal punishment was outlawed for the few remaining independent schools that retained the practice.
The issue of corporal punishment must now be considered in light of the Human Rights Act 1998 and the European Convention of Human Rights, particularly Article Three on protection against torture, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.
The provisions of the Convention of the Rights of the Child 1989 is also important for child punishment, as Article 19 states: "Parties shall take all appropriate legislative, administrative, social and educational measures to protect the child from all forms of physical or mental violence, injury or abuse, neglect or negligent treatment, maltreatment or exploitation."
ControversiesCorporal punishment remains legal when used by parents. Since 1860, parents have been permitted to use 'reasonable chastisement' on their children - and this remains the case today, except in Scotland, which has legislated to ban parental corporal punishment.
In 1995 the Committee on the Rights of the Child, after examining the UK's first report under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, recommended that corporal punishment in the family should be prohibited, and criticised the existence of the defence of "reasonable chastisement".
Following the 1997 case of A v. UK in the European Court of Human Rights, which found that the defence of 'reasonable chastisement' did not provide sufficient protection for the rights of the child, the Government promised a review.
Despite persistent public enthusiasm for corporal punishment, no mainstream political party in the UK seriously plans to reverse the trend of the past 50 years.
Quotes"There is little evidence that corporal punishment was in general an effective deterrent either to the pupils punished or to other pupils."
Elton Committee, 1989
"We are in a position to prevent corporal punishment in schools. We are probably not in a position to prevent corporal punishment in the home. It is not that corporal punishment is good in one case and bad in the other. It is bad in all cases."
Baroness Warnock, School Standards and Framework Bill Committee stage, June 1998