In this issue:
Report on annual conference
Sue Relf – Family Life Award 2004
From the Director’s Report…
Local Reports
Children Bill Update
(a) parental discipline
(b) children’s commissioner
(c) information databases
Why smacking should not be banned
Sweden and the BBC
AGM 2005
Annual General Meeting & Conference
12 June 2004
The Annual General Meeting and Conference at the Royal Air Force Club, Piccadilly, was again a good and heartening day. We are told that if the trumpet gives an uncertain sound then no one will prepare for battle. There was nothing uncertain about the trumpet sound being given throughout the day, not least from the two doughty speakers in the afternoon.
Some 70 members attended (with official apologies from another 55) and went away prepared for battle. A theme of the day was the need for more members, especially young ones. With Robert Whelan handing over to Norman Wells as Director, and Valerie Riches paying glowing tributes to both, the feeling was of a strong and much needed organisation planning well for its future.
The official business of apologies and other matters was, as usual, efficiently dealt with, and the Chairman, Arthur Cornell, gave his report. He thanked all members for their work and especially the retiring Director, Robert Whelan, for his professionalism, and the new Director, former assistant, Norman Wells and the staff and the committee and trustees, particularly Valerie and Denis Riches. He spoke of bad news: of some 60 MPs who want to criminalise parents who use any kind of physical chastisement; of the sinister government sex education schemes which took away parents’ rights to know even if their child was being given dangerous drugs or having an abortion; of the street wanderers; of the increase in the numbers of men aged 18 to 25 being imprisoned; and of the huge numbers of teachers leaving the profession because of the lack of discipline. He said that a great secret was that this year was supposed to be the Year of the Family: the government and the BBC were keeping quiet about this. With all these assaults on children and young people, our work was more necessary than ever.
In his Hon Treasurer’s report, Simon Ling, explained the accounts. Strictly speaking, because of the size of our income, we need not have auditors but he thought it was a good idea to have them, despite the big expense. Income had gone up, though only due to increased literature sales. In answer to a question he said that there was not a membership fee as such, but those wanting the bulletin were asked to pay £10 a year. A suggestion that the minimum subscription should be raised to £20 received general support but was not formally adopted.
In his Outgoing Director’s report, Robert Whelan said that his appointment as Director had been a serendipitous idea of Valerie Riches and had not been intended as a permanent one. He had enjoyed and valued the work which he had been able to combine with his work for Civitas to the benefit of both organisations. He praised the work of his former assistant, now Director, Norman Wells, and suggested that he himself had become ‘de trop’, a suggestion which brought good-humoured murmurs of denial from the members.
In his first speech as Director, Norman Wells paid tribute to his predecessor and to Valerie and Denis Riches. He reported that the website was attracting around 2,500 visitors per month and that there was continued interest in the curriculum resource, The Art of Loving Well.
The new edition of Valerie Riches’ book, Sex Education Or Indoctrination?, had received good press coverage, especially since its publication coincided with the release of disturbing teenage pregnancy figures. Copies of the book had been sent to MPs and other policy-makers. (In the afternoon, Valerie Riches herself was to pay tribute to Norman Wells for all the work he had done in the preparation of that report).
The move to the new address had gone smoothly and the media had lost no time in finding their way there.
Mr Wells commented on developments within parliament and Whitehall which threatened to undermine the family and noted that increased state involvement in the raising of children was coming to the fore on the public policy agenda (see the extract from the Director’s report elsewhere in this bulletin).
On a more positive note, some health professionals were beginning to acknowledge that policies advocating more sex education and easier availability of contraception to young people were proving counterproductive. The Trust’s publication, Deconstructing the Dutch Utopia was continuing to exercise an influence in this regard.
Two items of formal business were efficiently, properly and speedily enacted. Those third of the trustees who retired by rotation were re-elected: Betty Lady Grantchester, Mr Denis Riches and Dr Trevor Stammers. Similarly, the third of the executive committee who retired in their turn were also re-elected: Mr Simon Ling, Mrs Cornelia Oddie, Mrs Valerie Riches and Mr Robert Whelan.
In the afternoon, first Professor Dennis O’Keeffe spoke on ‘The true purpose of education: the inculcation of virtue’. He broke his talk into three parts – the purpose of education; what makes a good school; and the political economy of virtue and vice. Going back to Plato and Aristotle, he explained how education should be concerned with the pursuit of virtue and not merely of knowledge for its own sake. Both educational psychology and educational sociology had, in practice, been corrupt and corrupting. Education should be ‘the search for the good’. Since 1870, our educational system had been ‘supply led’ and increasingly controlled from the centre. A successful reform of education, restoring to parents involvement in their children’s schooling, would virtually eliminate illiteracy and moral teaching would be paramount.
We have become used to Mr Peter Dawson OBE, chairing the afternoon sessions but this year he gave an address on ‘The Race between Education and Catastrophe’. He mentioned that he was one of the oldest members of our association going back to early days. He recalled that a past Secretary of State for Education, the late Edward Short in the 1960s had prophesied, falsely, that the organisation would not last. His talk was enlivened by true incidents from his long and successful years as a headmaster. His main message was that we must ‘stay awake’ in the biblical sense. The changes happening were not inevitable. We must work ourselves and convince others. One especially impressive feature about Peter Dawson’s talk was that he did not seek easy popularity or quick solutions. Asked about the restoration of judicial corporal punishment, he made it clear that while he was not opposed to it in principle, he believed it could have only a limited part to play in any turn around of society. Real and lasting changes had to start in the family.
In between the speakers, the Family Life Award 2004 was given to Sue Relf for her work especially with Challenge Teams. The citation is given in full elsewhere, but it should be mentioned that this was a very popular award.
After the votes of thanks, Valerie Riches spoke about the past and the future of the Trust. She spoke very highly of the work of Robert Whelan, who would still be with us as trustee, and of Norman Wells, the new director who was carrying on the great work of Family and Youth Concern. She asked all members to work hard, not to give in and to try to recruit and encourage more people to carry on the fight.
Eric Hester, Vice Chairman
Sue Relf – Family Life Award 2004
The Family Life Award 2004 was made to Sue Relf for her clear vision and determination to provide young people with the opportunity to encounter, evaluate and adopt positive lifestyles. With the full support of her husband, Martyn, Sue has sought to provide a pathway to committed healthy relationships and give a sense of personal integrity.
Firstly, Sue was instrumental in the setting up of ‘Wise Up’, a programme for girls in their early teens to help them cope with pressure from the media, from teenage magazines and from their own peers. Operating after school in independent premises, the programme has proved useful in supporting vulnerable teenagers with a realistic message presented in an appealing and engaging way. It has won wide recognition for the way it seeks to support rather than undermine struggling families.
Secondly, having heard about the ‘Challenge Team’ initiative in Canada, Sue was instrumental in bringing teams of Canadian young people to this country and introducing them to British schools where they gave a lively presentation promoting an abstinent lifestyle as a radical alternative to high-risk casual sexual relationships. She has subsequently piloted a British version of the programme in schools and youth clubs of various types in a number of counties in the UK.
The development of home-grown teams proved to be a huge challenge demanding great persistence, comprehensive networking and administrative acumen and Sue has faced considerable opposition in a climate where local authority teenage pregnancy strategies do not recognise sexual abstinence as a realistic option for young people. However, her perseverance was rewarded by the overwhelmingly positive response from staff and pupils alike to the first tour by the ‘Challenge Team UK’. There is every reason to hope that, in time, the abstinence-based approach, presented with realism and good humour will gain credibility and be taken seriously.
Thirdly, in addition to their continuing commitment to families in their community, in recent years Sue and Martyn have taken responsibility for a family of boys who otherwise would have been taken into care. With their own children having grown up, they have taken on the parenting role all over again, with the most heart-warming results. It has not been easy; it has been hugely time-consuming and it has demanded quality organisational skills, but the Relfs have shown the difference that good parenting can make to the welfare of children.
In making this award, we are appreciating Sue’s vision, and all the courage, enthusiasm and commitment she has shown in making it a reality. Her dedication has shown that it is never too late to reverse the tide with a positive message that can benefit individuals, families, and society as a whole.
From the Director’s Report…
In Westminster a whole raft of measures has been debated in recent months which could have the effect of further undermining marriage and the family as we know it. There has been the Gender Recognition Bill with its failure to recognise the lifelong distinction between male and female, and the Civil Partnerships Bill which, as originally drafted, set out to offer homosexual couples the same rights as married couples. And a document published last November by the Women and Equality Unit announced plans to delete any reference to marriage from official forms:
“It is envisaged that Government forms currently asking for details of a person’s “marital status” would be altered to read “civil status”. This category would then include both marriage and civil partnership and there would be no automatic presumption of someone’s sexual orientation. Other requests for personal details would be amended, wherever possible, to ensure that references specific to marriages or civil partnerships were replaced with neutral terms.”1
There is little doubt that in the months and years to come we shall see further threats to the autonomy of the family and to parental authority and responsibility. Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland already have children’s commissioners and the current Children Bill makes provision for a children’s commissioner for England. There is every indication that the children’s rights lobby will seek to use these offices as a vehicle to further a rights-based agenda which views and treats children as autonomous individuals rather than as members of a family.
When the leading children’s rights campaigner, Peter Newell, was asked by the parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights how he thought a children’s commission could concern itself with what happens to children in the privacy of their families, he replied:
“Human rights do not stop at the door of the family home any more than they stop at the school gates. Whether the commissioner should have the right of access to the family home, that seems to me something that within this country we are not ready for and if we advocate it at this point it would probably delay us having a children’s commissioner for many more years… At the moment my view is that it would be unhelpful to advocate a direct right of access for the commissioner to the family home.”2 (emphasis added)
A ‘Commission on Families and the Wellbeing of Children’ has recently been founded as a joint initiative of the government-funded National Family & Parenting Institute and NCH Action for Children. This new body has launched ‘an inquiry into the relationship between the state and the family in the upbringing of children’. The consultation period runs from 1 June to 10 September 2004. Four areas are highlighted for special consideration:
- ‘the state’s function in supporting families in bringing up children;
- ‘the scope of the state’s role in intervening in the way families bring up children and in respect of families and children at risk;
- ‘the role of the state in relation to parents’ regulation of their children’s behaviour;
- ‘the degree of formality and transparency to be given to the interface between government and families’
This follows on from a paper published last year by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation and written by the Head of Research and Policy at the National Family & Parenting Institute. The paper was entitled, Government and Parenting. It referred to ‘growing international government involvement in parenting’ and went on to state that:
“in a well-regulated modern society it is unthinkable that parent-child relationships would be exempt from government control..”3
We say it every year, but it’s no less true for that: there has never been a greater need for the work that we are doing in seeking to promote stable family life and to enhance the protection of children.
References
1. Women and Equality Unit (2003), Responses to Civil Partnership: A framework for the legal recognition of same-sex couples, p.44.
2. Joint Committee on Human Rights, Twenty-second Report of Session 2001-02, The Case for a Human Rights Commission: Interim Report, EV35.
3. Clem Henricson (2003), Government and parenting: Is there a case for a policy review and a parents’ code? Joseph Rowntree Foundation, p.2.
Norman Wells
Local Reports
As ever, the reports on local activities made a very important and useful contribution to the annual conference. Those reporting frequently made reference to how they had been assisted by the Director who had supplied help or put them in touch with others. Any member who wishes to be in touch with anyone about any of the following could contact Norman Wells at the office, since it is vital for good people to work together and learn from each other.
Scotland
Ann Allen, reported on the Scottish Executive’s proposals for family law reform and on the establishment of a commissioner for children in Scotland. The forthcoming Family Law Bill would give automatic parental rights to unmarried fathers and substantially reduce the waiting time for both consensual and non-consensual divorce. Issues that remained under discussion included the rights of cohabiting couples and grandparents’ rights of access to their grandchildren.
Mrs Allen expressed relief that while the commissioner was empowered to investigate agencies, she could not become involved in individual cases. It remained to be seen whether or not her influence on policy would be welcome.
Republic of Ireland
John O’Reilly’s report was read by Dr John Guly. He paid tribute to Valerie Riches whose talk had led to setting up the Irish branch in 1980. Its 48-page quarterly magazine, Response, with a print-run of 1,000, continued to present accurate information and statistics to activists, journalists and religious and political leaders. Ireland had the same problems as the United Kingdom, albeit with a time lag in their intensity. Since 1980, the proportion of births outside marriage had risen from 5% to 31%; abortions had doubled, the incidence of sexually transmitted infections had quadrupled, and the number of babies born per annum had fallen by 32%.
Cornwall
As usual, the AGM had a staunch report from Ann Whitaker who, together with Councillor Mrs Carlyon (unable to attend the meeting owing to duties as Mayor of Truro), had led opposition to the county’s teenage pregnancy strategy. The County Council had become so ashamed of the increase in the rate of teenage conceptions that it was now open to considering the role that abstinence education might play. Miss Whitaker and her team were examining abstinence materials with a view to identifying suitable material to promote in schools.
A further conference on abstinence education had been organised and cassette recordings were being widely circulated. Miss Whitaker’s advice for having an impact at the local level was to have one councillor who will not give in, supported by 50 people who will attend all the relevant meetings.
Northern Ireland
Mary Russell’s report was read by the vice-chairman. Mary noted that during the past year there had been ‘a growing amalgam of government departments, children’s charities, law reform associations and representatives of health and education bodies, promoting and advancing the liberal agenda… Nowhere does the [sexual health promotion] strategy endorse a change of thinking which might bring about a shift in the behaviour of young people; rather the plan is to manage the consequences of early or multiple sex and provide more sex education in schools and more sex clinics in the High Street…I and others here continue to write to the press on issues affecting the family and phone in to radio programmes to put forward our views on matters covered by the Family Education Trust. These subjects have been wide-ranging and we have been helped enormously by the information in FYC bulletins and publications.’
Oxfordshire
Eileen Wojciechowska reported on her ongoing campaign against contraceptive clinics operating in secondary schools in Oxfordshire. The government had increased funding for its teenage pregnancy strategy from £21 million to £40 million in 2004/5. It was noted that in the USA, the morning-after pill had not been approved for use without a prescription, whereas in Oxfordshire three pharmacies in deprived areas were making it available to girls aged under 16.
Leicestershire
Richard Bloor, a governor at a Leicestershire comprehensive school, related how he had learned from a local newspaper report of the introduction into the school of a clinic offering contraception. Richard described the help he had received from the Trust as he battled to secure a discussion of the matter on the governing body. He noted that Muslim parents were opposed to the proposals and questioned the legality of a school proceeding with such an initiative without the governors’ prior approval. He also observed that the school was giving the morning-after pill to underage girls against whom illegal acts had been committed without reporting them to the police.
Challenge Team UK
Sue Relf reported on the success of the first tour of a British team. Her long-term vision was to offer an annual presentation to all 5,000 secondary schools in the UK. She was therefore looking for regional organisers and was beginning to make contact with individuals in different parts of the country who could help the team obtain access into schools in their area.
Children Bill Update
The Children Bill completed its passage through the House of Lords on 15 July and now passes to the House of Commons, where it will be debated after the summer recess. We remain concerned about the three issues highlighted in Bulletin 115.
(a) Parental Discipline
Following a three-hour debate on 5 July, peers voted by a margin of 250 to 75 against an amendment which would have made all parental smacking a criminal offence.
However, they supported by 226 votes to 91 an amendment moved by Lord Lester which would limit the defence of reasonable chastisement to charges of common assault. When the government previously considered pursuing this option in a public consultation in 2000, it concluded that: ‘Although it seems attractive to limit the defence to the lesser charge, the legal responses strongly suggest that restricting the availability of the reasonable chastisement defence to common assault could result in overcharging in order to avoid the defence.’1
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) held that it would be ‘wrong’ to limit the defence to charges of common assault since there was ‘an overlap between common assault and assault occasioning actual bodily harm. For example, a very minor bruise could, as a matter of law, be charged as actual bodily harm.’ The CPS also stated that such a change in the law was ‘unnecessary because whether the defence will succeed will be dependent on the circumstances, including the injuries inflicted’.2
The Association of Chief Police Officers pointed out that in the majority of cases involving children, assault occasioning actual bodily harm was the preferred charge as it allowed the child to give evidence by video in court. Restricting the defence of reasonable chastisement to those charged with common assault could therefore have the effect of denying the defence to the majority of parents charged with assault on a child.3
These concerns were shared by Judge D Elgan Edwards who, as Chairman of the Criminal Sub-Committee of the Council of HM Circuit Judges submitted: ‘Sometimes the distinction between common assault and ABH is a fine one and if the defence was restricted to the former might lead to overcharging, i.e. charging the more serious offence to seek to remove the reasonable chastisement defence.’4
During the course of the recent House of Lords debate, the Attorney-General, Lord Goldsmith, announced that the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) intended to amend the CPS charging standards in such a way that ‘even minor assaults by a parent on a child’ would ‘normally be charged as assault occasioning actual bodily harm’, even where the level of injuries would usually lead to a charge of common assault. This was justified on the basis that an ‘assault’ on a child by an adult was to be regarded as a ‘serious aggravating feature’.5
Until we receive further details of the DPP’s plans, it is difficult to see how Lord Lester’s amendment ‘clarifies the law’ as claimed by government ministers. In view of the statements from legal authorities referred to above, it is also difficult to derive comfort from ministerial assurances that ‘the Lords decision will not criminalise ordinary decent parents for smacking their children in a way that does not harm them’.6
(b) Children’s Commissioner
Following a government defeat at committee stage, the children’s commissioner will have a rights-based function, with scope to conduct an investigation into the case of an individual child. The amendment, supported by Barnardo’s, the Children’s Rights Alliance for England, the Children’s Society, the NSPCC, Save the Children and Unicef, also empowers the commissioner to provide assistance to a child in bringing legal proceedings.
(c) Information Databases
The government has amended the Bill to stipulate that the information to be held on the electronic database covering all children is to include ‘name, address, date of birth, person with parental responsibility, unique identifying number, educational setting and GP practice details’. Case records would not be included. However, it remains open-ended with considerable discretion granted to the Secretary of State. Government minister, Baroness Ashton explained, ‘we want to retain the power in regulation to add information that may be required in the future’.
The government has also said that it wishes to retain flexibility as to whether databases are established on a national, regional or local basis. It will be embarking on a public consultation in the autumn to help inform its regulations and guidance on matters such how practitioners should indicate the existence of a concern on the database and the extent to which confidentiality should be preserved where young people are accessing ‘sensitive services’ (e.g. family planning and abortion clinics).
References
1. Department of Health (2001), Analysis of Responses to the Protecting Children, Supporting Parents Consultation Document.
2. Crown Prosecution Service response to Protecting Children, Supporting Parents http://www.publications.doh.gov.uk/pcspresponse/documents/2011.pdf
3. Department of Health (2001), op cit
4. ibid
5. HL Deb (2003-04) 663, col. 563.
6. Correspondence with Baroness Ashton of Upholland, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State, 12 July 2004.
Why smacking should not be banned
If we are seriously concerned about the protection and welfare of children, we should not pursue a ban on smacking, and should resist the attempt of a vocal minority to impose their own views on parental discipline by force of law.
A ban on smacking would not give children more protection, but less. It would divert already overstretched child protection resources away from the children who need them most, and expose happy children from loving homes to the trauma and potential damage of police and social service interventions, even though they are at no risk of harm.
The current law already protects children from unreasonable and excessive punishment. Since the European Court of Human Rights ruled in the case of A v UK (1998), our courts have been obliged to take account of ‘the nature and context of the treatment, its duration, its physical and mental effects and, in some instances, the sex, age and state of health’ of the child. If there have been any recent cases of genuine child abuse where a prosecution has failed solely because of the reasonable chastisement defence, the fault lies not within the law itself, but in its administration.
In Sweden, the 1979 smacking ban contributed to a 489% increase in physical child abuse cases classified as criminal assaults from 1981-1994, and the perpetration of criminal assaults against 7-14 year-olds is increasing most rapidly in age groups raised after the law against smacking was passed. According to Unicef, Sweden’s rate of child maltreatment deaths differs very little from that of the UK, and of the five countries with the lowest rates of child abuse deaths, only one has a ban on smacking.
Parents have a unique relationship with their children, bearing unique responsibilities and unique powers, and an occasional disciplinary smack is by no means incompatible with a warm family life where children are loved and cherished. It is ludicrous to suggest that there is no difference between loving physical correction by a parent and a violent assault perpetrated by a stranger. There are many things that parents do to and for their children every day that would be quite inappropriate, if not illegal, to do to another adult, which is why the anti-smacking lobby’s appeal to the principle of ‘equality’ is so deeply flawed.
It is parents and not the state who are entrusted with responsibility for the care and nurture of their children. The state should intervene only in cases where there is evidence that a child is suffering significant harm. If the state attempts to dictate how parents may and may not discipline their children, it has gone beyond its remit and is exercising authority where it has no responsibility.
Norman Wells
This article first appeared in The Times 5 July 2004.
Sweden and the BBC
Among the myths being perpetrated by the anti-smacking lobby is the claim that in the 25 years since all physical correction of children was banned in Sweden, there have been only four child abuse deaths, compared with one a week in the United Kingdom.
However, figures published in the Unicef report Child Maltreatment Deaths in Rich Nations (September 2003), reveal that during a five-year period in the 1990s, deaths from maltreatment occurred at an annual rate of 0.5 or 0.6 children per 100,000 aged under 15 in Sweden, compared with 0.4 or 0.9 in the United Kingdom, depending on whether or not unconfirmed cases were included. Of the four countries with the lowest child maltreatment death rates (Spain, Greece, Italy and Ireland), none have a ban on smacking.
Despite our best efforts to present the BBC1 Politics Show team with the truth when they called for a recorded interview in mid-June, alas, the fable was again relayed as incontrovertible fact on the following weekend’s broadcast, aggravated by its being displayed in text form emblazoned across the screen on the respective nations’ flags.
We subsequently took this up with the programme editors who, to their credit, made thorough enquiries which took them, via the NSPCC, to Canada, Sweden and Unicef.
Finally, on 4 July, the Politics Show broadcast the following correction:
“On our programme three weeks ago, we carried an item about the possibility of a ban on smacking, and in that film we stated that in Sweden where they have a ban on smacking, only four children have died from child abuse in 25 years, whereas in the UK the equivalent figure is one a week.
“Now, we got these figures from the NSPCC and they are, indeed, startling, but alas they are also misleading. In fact, according to the Swedish Bureau of Statistics and Unicef, the rate of child mortality at the hands of parents or carers in Sweden is at a comparable level with the UK, and we are very happy to correct that impression.”
AGM 2005
Next year’s AGM and conference will be held on Saturday 25 June 2005 at the RAF Club, 128 Piccadilly, London W1.