No more girls will be paced in solitary confinement at the Girls Industrial School at Barrows, St Lucy.
An apologetic Minister of Home Affairs Wilfred Abrahams yesterday revealed he had stopped the archaic practice at the institution with immediate effect, less than a week after this newspaper broke the news that a photograph had been taken which showed a 14-year-old girl naked in a cell at Barrows.
Abrahams publicly apologised to the child’s parents and to the Barbadian public, while accepting there needed to be a complete overhaul at the school.
“This was a most unfortunate incident and one where I called the parent and grandparent of the child involved to apologise for and on behalf of the institution, the Government and the people of Barbados,” he said during a nationally televised virtual press conference.
“Acting on the advice of independent professionals and agencies such as the United Nations Children’s Fund, I have given instruction that the age-old practice of children being detained in isolation, under circumstances less than unacceptable, is archaic and unwarranted in this day and age and must cease as a matter of urgency,” he said. (BA)
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