All LAWS THAT allow for the state-sponsored beating of children should be repealed.
This is the view of former Juvenile Court Magistrate Faith Marshall-Harris, who is leading the charge to reform of child, women and family laws.
“Wherever the law says the state can administer corporal punishment, it should be taken out of the laws of Barbados. Let us start there,” she said.
The legal consultant and UNICEF Children’s Champion called for the repealing of the Juvenile Offenders Act and similar laws that allow for court-ordered, police-administered whippings to teenage boys.
Conceding that her views would not be welcomed by some, Marshall-Harris also suggested that the ban on beatings be applied in a limited way to schools as well. She said the law should be changed to restrict the use of the rod to cases of discipline and not for failure in any area of academics.
“I know of one school in Barbados where there is no corporal punishment and the discipline is still very good,” she said.
Corporal punishment seemed to do no good, but withdrawal of privileges was more of a punishment, she added.
However, her suggestion brought a swift reply from principal of the Graydon Sealy Secondary School, Matthew Farley, who was part of the audience attending a town hall meeting at Christ Church Foundation School last Wednesday night. He warned that to remove corporal punishment from schools would result in “bedlam”.
Farley, an educator for four decades, said he was not advocating “brutality or violence” against children, or suggesting that corporal punishment was “a panacea” for solving all the problems in the schools. However, he said that “the majority of our children are deterred from certain types of behaviour by its retention”.
Farley said Government’s yearly investment of $500 million in education was under threat as a result of indiscipline in schools.
“While I support your concerns to protect children’s rights, there are other children in schools who have a right to an education and their rights are being undermined and threatened by the behaviour of other children,” he added.
Marshall-Harris interrupted Farley, telling him he seemed to have “come prepared with that, so it is difficult for you to hear anything I said in my presentation. I said educators have stressed that they need it for the purposes of discipline. However, I would recommend that it would be used only for disciplinary matters and not for work,” she explained. “You won’t beat a child because he doesn’t understand math. That is all I’m saying at this stage in my recommendations.”
Farley replied that in 95 per cent of cases “across the system”, corporal punishment was used for behavioural issues and not schoolwork.
Marshall-Harris responded that while that might be so, the fact it was still on the statute books meant it could be used by some principals for curriculum-related matters.
Farley cautioned against the importation of laws from other jurisdictions without giving thought to differing cultural norms and practices. (AGB
