{"id":1207,"date":"2017-06-20T09:32:12","date_gmt":"2017-06-20T08:32:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.endcorporalpunishment.net\/?p=1207"},"modified":"2017-10-07T09:35:40","modified_gmt":"2017-10-07T08:35:40","slug":"consultation-opened-on-the-england-and-wales-cps-charging-standard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/endcorporalpunishment.org\/consultation-opened-on-the-england-and-wales-cps-charging-standard\/","title":{"rendered":"Consultation opened on the England and Wales CPS Charging Standard"},"content":{"rendered":"

In England and Wales, corporal punishment is lawful in the home under section 58 of the Children Act 2004, which provides for \u201creasonable punishment\u201d of children. Although the Children Act 2004 removed the recourse to the \u201creasonable punishment\u201d defence for any offence more severe than common assault, at the time the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS)\u00a0Offences against the person Charging Standard<\/em>\u00a0specifically advised that where the victim was a child the threshold for defining common assault would be changed so that \u201cother than reddening of the skin, the charge will normally be assault occasioning actual bodily harm\u201d.<\/p>\n

However in 2011, the Charging Standard was amended to state that a charge of assault occasioning actual bodily harm could only be brought if the injuries were serious; to determine the seriousness of the injury \u201crelevant factors may include, for example, the fact that there has been significant medical intervention and\/or permanent effects have resulted\u201d.[1] This means that for \u201cless serious\u201d injuries such as bruises, welts and cuts that do not require stitches, the \u201creasonable punishment\u201d defence can be invoked, where previously the threshold was a \u201creddening of the skin\u201d.<\/p>\n

The CPS is now opening a consultation on the revised\u00a0Offences against the person Charging Standard<\/em>, which only applies in England and Wales. This provides an opportunity to highlight the inconsistency between the Government\u2019s declarations and the current state of the law (see Note below) as well as the Government\u2019s consistent refusal to abide by its international obligation to prohibit all corporal punishment in law. Under the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the UK must prohibit all corporal punishment of children, however light, in all settings of their lives. This means the defence of \u201creasonable punishment\u201d must be removed.<\/p>\n

The CPS has produced a\u00a0draft revised\u00a0Offences against the person Charging Standard<\/em><\/a>. Comments are welcome and should be sent to\u00a0Kwame.biney@cps.gsi.gov.uk<\/a>\u00a0by Thursday 27 July 2017. The finalised standards will then be published later this year.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Note:<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The UK Government has repeatedly rejected recommendations to explicitly prohibit corporal punishment and to repeal the defence of \u201creasonable punishment\u201d. In its national report to the Universal Periodic Review which took place in May 2017, and where the UK received a record seven recommendations on the prohibition of corporal punishment of children, it asserted that:<\/p>\n

\u201cThe [UK Government] does not condone any violence towards children and has clear laws to deal with it. But parents should not be criminalised for giving a child a mild smack in order to control their behaviour. The \u201creasonable chastisement\u201d defence is only available when the charge is one of common assault; it cannot be used when someone is charged with assault causing actual or grievous bodily harm, or with child cruelty.\u201d[2]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In England and Wales, corporal punishment is lawful in the home under section 58 of the Children Act 2004, which provides for \u201creasonable punishment\u201d of children. Although the Children Act 2004 removed the recourse to the \u201creasonable punishment\u201d defence for any offence more severe than common assault, at the time the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS)\u00a0Offences […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[41],"class_list":["post-1207","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-europe"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/endcorporalpunishment.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1207","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/endcorporalpunishment.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/endcorporalpunishment.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/endcorporalpunishment.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/endcorporalpunishment.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1207"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/endcorporalpunishment.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1207\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1208,"href":"https:\/\/endcorporalpunishment.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1207\/revisions\/1208"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/endcorporalpunishment.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1207"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/endcorporalpunishment.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1207"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/endcorporalpunishment.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1207"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}