In , its education committee reported: if any conclusion is to be drawn from these statistics it is that the abolition of corporal punishment gradually, and now as a matter of policy, has had the effect of reducing, rather than increasing, the number of suspensions.
It is also said that corporal punishment should be retained because it is used only infrequently, as a last resort, or as the ultimate deterrent for serious offences. This is nonsense. Both official education authority statistics and inspectorate reports have shown that in some schools there are hundreds of canings a year. Many cif these must be for trivial offences. This was admitted by the Government in the White Paper "Better Schools", which acknowledged that corporal punishment is in many schools used only for relatively minor offences.
As long as corporal punishment is legal in some schools, it will continue to be used extremely frequently. I have no desire to provoke my hon. Friend into the long speech with which he has threatened us, but does he not agree that the schools to which he referred are a small minority?
Does he also agree that, increasingly, corporal punishment is being used more infrequently every year? I wish that I could agree with my hon. Friend, but the facts do not support what he is saying. He has encouraged me to insert a huge chunk into my speech of numerous examples of exactly what I mean. Corporal punishment is still widespread and often frequent. It has been abolished by 34 of our education authorities, and is retained by I am delighted that my county education authority in Wiltshire has recently seen the light.
The abolitionist authorities include those of all types across the country, whether they are county councils, London boroughs, Welsh county councils or Scottish regional councils. They are diverse politically, and include Conservative-controlled Berkshire and alliance-controlled Richmond.
I find disturbing the rules in the retentionist authorities. Some 84 allow corporal punishment for primary school children, 87 allow it for sixth formers, 77 allow it for handicapped children. Some 86 place no limit on the number of blows allowed, 80 allow corporal punishment to be carried out in public, 60 allow male teachers to give corporal punishment to girls and 89 allow female teachers to give corporal punishment to boys.
It is an interesting concept that it is more acceptable to allow women to beat boys than to allow men to beat girls. Let us not go too far down that intriguing road. Local authority bans protect about 3 million schoolchildren from corporal punishment, roughly one third of our school population. In Scotland, over 90 per cent.
Maintained schools in England and Wales keep punishment books. These have been referred to, but generally without statistics, so I feel obliged to put the statistics in front of my hon. Friends so that they can judge them. They show that in many areas, corporal punishment in schools is still frequent.
Extrapolating nationally from the published figures suggests that there are about , officially recorded instances of corporal punishment each year. For instance, in Mid Glamorgan there were 9, recorded instances in secondary schools in —81, and in primary schools.
In Cleveland, 12, were recorded in secondary schools from September to May In one comprehensive, Dyke House comprehensive in Cleveland, 1, canings were recorded between September and May Deputy Speaker, if my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, North would listen to me. I had the courtesy to listen to him in silence. I shall quote it even more if I am encouraged in this way. I shall be making my speech at greater length unless my hon.
Friend does me the courtesy of listening to me. One could go on quoting examples, but certain themes emerge from the statistics that are unpalatable to my hon. First, there is a tremendous variation from education authority to education authority.
Secondly, some children get corporal punishment again and again. The Cleveland figures show that two boys were caned 25 times in one year and another 24 times in the following year. Thirdly, children of all ages are liable to corporal punishment. The sad fact is that even physically and mentally handicapped children are subject to this.
We have seen that the corporal punishment of girls is practised, but is less common, although by no means rare. It said: as a court penalty, corporal punishment is not an effective method of dealing with young offenders. Flogging in the Army was banned in , but was not finally outlawed in the Navy until Corporal punishment in borstals and prisons was banned in We should not beat convicted criminals, but innocent children are fair game.
The campaign to persuade Parliament to end corporal punishment in schools began in , when a schoolboy presented Mr. Speaker with the Children's Petition. Friend said that corporal punishment does not deter. On one occasion when I was appearing in court, two probation officers were discussing that point.
One of them said that his defendant was from the Isle of Man, where he had been birched, but he was in court again. The young man said from the corner, "But I wouldn't do it again in the Isle of Man. That may be so, but unfortunately for my hon. Friend, birching has been abolished in the Isle of Man. I am surprised that she is advocating the use of the birch. That is going a bit far, even for some of my hon.
The campaign to persuade Parliament to end corporal punishment to schools began in with the Children's Petition, which suggests that a teacher who is not able to awe and keep a company of youth in obedience without violence and stripes should judge himself no more fit for that function. Times have not changed in that respect.
Beating is a dangerous form of punishment, which is not even successful as a means of discipline. We have seen that corporal punishment is counter-productive.
Schools which use the cane have the worst classroom misbehaviour, the highest juvenile delinquency, the most vandalism and the worst attendance rates. The cane breeds resentment and fosters hostile teacher-pupil relationships and a negative and antagonistic atmosphere in schools. None of the education authorities which banned corporal punishment has been forced to reintroduce it. The practical experience of doing without it in Britain and overseas makes it clear that corporal punishment is not only undesirable but unnecessary.
As a Conservative, I believe in levelling up. Few of my colleagues would disagree that the highest educational standards, the strongest motivation and the best discipline are still to be found in traditional schools, which they probably attended.
Those schools have, almost without exception, ceased to use the cane. The parliamentary victims of the cane who say that no harm was done to them were lucky, because beating causes physical and mental damage to a significant minority. Of course, as I said earlier, they preferred it.
The last ditch argument is always: what, in the face of increasing indiscipline, can be put in place of the cane? During my 16 years' experience of teaching, without exception, the best headmasters, housemasters and teachers used punishment least and the inadequate indulged in it. Any teacher worth his or her salt will say that good discipline results from a host of complex, interacting factors and is not achieved by the simplistic hitting of a child with a stick. It is no good saying that we must get away from emotional language and that we must stop talking about beating, flogging or hitting children with sticks.
I have heard several hon. Members talking about a sharp tap on the bottom as a euphemism for corporal punishment. We cannot quibble about the delivery of that punishment. A rich harvest of alternatives to corporal punishment has been gleaned. I pay tributue to David Fontana, the senior lecturer at University college, Cardiff for stating the best practice for teachers in his book "Classroom Control".
The book encapsulates the best practice of all those, perhaps good, schoolmasters who taught Tory Back-Bench Members all those years ago—those hon. Members who ask constantly what can be put in place of the cane.
I refer them to that book. I even refer my hon. Friend the Member for Lancaster to it. I wish that she would read it and discover the alternatives to corporal punishment. The book encapsulates the best teaching practice. What is that best practice? It means good schools, where rules are few but are clear and are consistently applied. It means rules that are subject to change and development and a school with clear and efficient lines of communications between pupils and teachers at all levels and between the staff.
It also means decisions which are taken by the head and staff in a way which is never arbitrary but is related to the need for children to learn standards and values.
Such a school will have a positive purpose which is sensitive to all the ability-related differences between the children and to cultural factors. If the small print of the problems facing us bores my hon. Friends, I must say that frequently many of them say, "What will you put in its place? If something is to be put in the place of corporal punishment, it is the teachers who will do it and it is their experience and good will upon which we must, to a large extent, rely.
Most punishment arouses negative feelings in a child and usually draws attention to bad behaviour. Praise and encouragement are accepted and practised by parents and teachers. Teachers may add material rewards such as good marks, term reports, house points, privileges and special responsibilities, all of which are immediate, realistic, consistent and attractive to children. The withdrawal of those privileges and the denial of time are among the most effective sanctions available to a teacher.
The ridiculous fantasies creeping into our schools, such as the abandonment of egg-and-spoon races and the absurdity of denigrating football as a sport and calling it an invasion game, do nothing to help discipline any more than the abandoning of school uniform.
As ex-pupils and as parents, hon. Members know that teachers should be confident, careful, consistent, fair, aware and firm. They should set realistic standards and should, above all, enjoy teaching.
Sarcasm and humiliation in the classroom elicit nothing but rudeness and disobedience. If we wish our teachers to carry prestige and status and deliver to our children their educational birthright, we must look to the ACAS talks now in progress to set us on the road beyond the tragic dispute that we have experienced, and to the Secretary of State to implement the new partnership envisaged by the Bill, which I warmly congratulate the Government on introducing.
I agree with the hon. Member for Salisbury Mr. I, like many other hon. Members, have been in the teaching profession, and I may have a little more experience than some. During the past 10 years I have taught in a mixed comprehensive school.
During that period the use of the cane, which was never frequent, has become even less frequent. There are alternative ways of correcting children. There are no complete answers to the problems set by disruptive children.
We must work those things out as we go along. There are positive ways of considering the problem but corporal punishment is a negative way, as it tends to breed resentment. If one uses suspension, there is a cooling-off period. A child who is out of school for three or five days gets bored and wishes to return to the school environment, because he has been away from his friends.
That is much preferable to, and more positive than, corporal punishment. Many in the teaching profession, and most of the unions, now believe that corporal punishment should be phased out, on the ground that it is ineffectual and does not produce the results claimed.
To retain it on a voluntary basis would create an almost impossible position in many schools. It would be divisive, in that different pupils would be punished differently for the same offence. I wonder whether those hon. Members who are in favour of corporal punishment would he willing to accept it if you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, or Mr. Speaker, were to decide that you could inflict it when the House is noisy and when hon. Members are not listening to the Opposition.
I did not wish to intervene but there is one argument to which I feel I must draw attention. Member for Ryedale Mrs. Shields said that the school in which she had taught had corporal punishment, but that its use had diminished, and that she foresaw a time when it would be phased out. I do not disagree with that general approach, but it seems that the people involved in education must make decisions for themselves.
I would prefer, and I intend to vote on this basis, that schools should decide for themselves in conjunction with the governors. However, I do not wish to argue that point tonight as much passion has been devoted to it arid the arguments made on both sides of the House have gone over the top. There is freedom of manoeuvre in this House and it is wrong for hon. Members, including my hon. Friend the Member for Grantham Mr.
Hogg , who unfortunately is not in his place, to suggest that we are constrained by the European Court of Human Rights. We are neither legally for morally obliged to make this change tonight. I say that as, I think, the only Conservative Member to vote against the last Education Bill, because it is nonsense. I do not take the view adopted by my hon.
Budgen , which is that the more nonsense we vote for, the better. On the whole it is better to vote against it if possible. I have often made my next point, and I know that it is a failing cause, although it should be put on the record. Therefore, there is no moral obligation on this Parliament. It happens that because the original derived from a treaty, it passes through the House under the Ponsonby rules, and was therefore not subject to debate.
All Governments have failed to bring this matter to the House, even though they have an opportunity to do so everyfive years when the right to make private petitions to the court is brought up for renewal. Thus there is no moral obligation, although the question whether there is a legal obligation is more complex. I shall outline what I believe to be the position. The Government have entered into a treaty. They are undoubtedly bound by the decisions of the court.
However, this Parliament cannot be bound by the court's decisions. It remains a sovereign Parliament and can pass what laws it pleases. The Government come to Parliament to put the case for a change in the law so that they are not embarrassed by cases that go before the court. Thus, we are talking about the Government's embarrassment, and it is not up to this Parliament to bail them out unless the Government come to us with a proposition that we can accept in its own right.
So far, the Government have not come to us with such a proposition. As has been pointed out, the Government came to us with a ludicrous proposition.
On that occasion, many of my hon. Friends thought it appropriate to vote for that nonsense, although I did not. I do not propose to vote for this nonsense either. If the European Court of Human Rights believes that a person who has a philosophical objection to having his child beaten should be protected, why, as is the case in my constituency, do 80 per cent.
Radice keeps saying that I am talking about the impossible. But if he is anxious to reconcile the decision of the European Court of Human Rights, there is one clear and obvious solution. If the schools are left to decide for themselves, parents can choose which school to send their children to.
Shields would no doubt say that fewer and fewer schools would retain corporal punishment. Indeed, if the argument is convincing, more and more parents would choose to send their children to schools that did not have corporal punishment. What would happen if a parent sent his child to a school and then changed his mind just before the child was about to be beaten?
If the child was beaten, the parent might go off to the European Court of Human Rights on the basis that his right not to have his child beaten had been infringed by the school and that the British Government had, in effect, reneged on an order from the European Court of Human Rights. Friend has made his reputation in the House by thinking up extreme examples in order to ridicule Bills.
Indeed, he is fairly good at it. But I do not for a moment believe that any court would regard that as responsible behaviour by a citizen who had been given the opportunity to choose his school. I think that my hon. Friend understands that point.
Friends may believe and vote as they wish on this matter, but there is no constraint on them to take one decision or another as a result of the judgment of the European Court of Human Rights.
In trying to avoid what others have described as the mess of previous legislation and of attempts to deal with this issue, the hon. Member for Manchester, Withington Mr. Silvester suggested that responsibility should lie with the parents and that there should be absolute parental choice.
In other words, he believes that parents should be able to choose between a school that inflicts corporal punishment and one that does not. I was talking about the parents, governors and teachers who are responsible for a particular school. I accept that intervention, although it rather changes the hon. Gentleman's argument. I was going to say that parental choice would not be absolute in terms of the amendment, or in practice.
From our constituency experience we all know that there are substantial constraints on choice, in the form of school catchment areas, school buildings, school sizes, and so on.
Consequently parents cannot exercise any absolute choice. I think that it was the hon. Member for Grantham Mr. Hogg who said that we had two choices: to go for absolute abolition, or to allow parents to exercise their philosophical right to allow their children to opt out of corporal punishment.
Member for Grantham then said that that was an unacceptable approach, because it would involve two classes of children and two classes of punishment. That strong. I am also worried about the possible damage to the relationship between a parent and his child. If parents are to be able to choose whether their child should receive corporal punishment in certain circumstances — I shall not use emotive language such as "I want my child to be beaten"—a dangerous wedge may be driven between them and their child.
Might not a child say to his parents that other children do not have to suffer corporal punishment? I hope that the House will take the clear line outlined by the hon. Member for Grantham and that it will go for total abolition. I listened with great interest to the speech of the hon. In Committee, I listened on occasions when he was allowed to make some interesting interventions. I did not always agree with him, but tonight I almost totally agreed with him.
Indeed, my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hillsborough Mr. Flannery turned round and said that we would only disagree with him in his passing references to the value of this Bill. We may fundamentally disagree on that point, but there is much agreement between us on the issue of corporal punishment.
However, I was disappointed by the reception that Conservative Members gave the hon. Gentleman's speech. It is a commentary on the modern Conservative party that it cannot listen to debate without constant comment or childish behaviour. Gentleman made a powerful case, and I hope that those who speak in favour of the amendment tabled by the hon. Pawsey or, indeed, the hon. Member for Rugby and Kenilworth himself, will answer some of his points.
As yet, no hon. Member has done so. I shall list the arguments, and I hope that those who speak in this debate will try to meet them. For instance, why do we reserve corporal punishment only for the young? What justification is there for that? That point has not been answered. Why is there evidence that in schools where there are high levels of corporal punishment, there is also evidence of increasing unruly and antisocial behaviour?
No one has answered that point. Member for Salisbury made that argument effectively. No one has answered the point that when corporal punishment has been abolished, there is no deterioration in behaviour and discipline. Often there is the opposite, in that there is an improvement as there is a better atmosphere. In the debate no one has answered the argument that there is a substantial difference between schools that have corporal punishment and schools that do not.
If the evidence suggests any difference, it is that schools that do not have corporal punishment have the better atmosphere and behaviour, and the better disciplinary record. I look forward to the hon. Pawsey dealing with those points. No one has said why no individual local authority that has decided to abandon corporal punishment has gone back on that decision. No one has told us why that is a historical fact. I suspect that the reason is that, when local authorities take that decision, they recognise that it is right and stick by it.
During the debate, I should like to hear answers to those arguments, which have not yet been given. Three basic arguments have been put forward for retaining corporal punishment. First, there is the ear-clipping analogy, that it is a good idea to be clipped round the ear by one's parents, the local bobby or perhaps occasionally the teacher.
That is good for the child. It teaches him right from wrong, and is a beneficial process. That is used as a basis for saying that we need corporal punishment, and has been used in the debate. Even if one subscribes to the notion that the ear clip is a good thing in itself I am not wholly of that persuasion—there is a substantial difference between an ear clip and the process of corporal punishment.
The clipping of an ear by a parent is a spontaneous reaction — an understandable reaction in many circumstances. The process of corporal punishment is a deliberate act of violence to achieve certain objectives and ends.
One cannot put the argument on the basis of the ear clipping analogy. One must recognise that when one goes for deliberate violence, it has its own culture and atmosphere, and one must consider the implications. My argument is that when one creates that culture and atmosphere, one creates a set of reactions against it, which are not necessarily beneficial for our society.
The second argument is that we do not need the cane; it is just a deterrent. I have heard the deterrent argument in other contexts. There is a point in that argument when one has to say that if the weapon is a deterrent, one is prepared to use it.
Then the argument shifts its ground because the weapon is no longer a deterrent—the hon. Greenway used this expression — but it becomes a symbol of fear in the classroom. It is a way of frightening young people. There is something wrong with our society, our education and our teaching profession if the only way in which we can provide education and learning is on the basis of fear.
All the available evidence shows that if we can provide a different atmosphere in which people learn from each other and with each other, we shall get much better results. I do not believe for a moment that one can educate through fear; one can educate only through challenge, initiative and opportunity. Fear is not the basis upon which one enhances people's view of the world and their willingness to learn. That argument falls, as does the third, which is simple.
Those who want to retain corporal punishment simply say, "What is the alternative? We have run out of arguments and ideas, so we'll throw the ball into your court. Home Explore the BBC. My advice to members is - carry on caning David Hart, teachers' union. In , beatings in state schools were outlawed. The ban was not extended to fee-paying schools until March In Britain until the late 20th century teachers were allowed to hit children. In the 19th century hitting boys and girls with a bamboo cane became popular.
In the 20th century, the cane was used in both primary and secondary schools. Meanwhile, the ruler was a punishment commonly used in primary schools in the 20th century.
The teacher hit the child on the hand with a wooden ruler. The slipper was often used in secondary schools. The slipper is a euphemism. Normally it was a trainer or a plimsoll. Teachers usually PE teachers used a trainer to hit children on the backside. The tawse was a punishment used in Scottish schools. It was a leather strap with two or three tails.
Meanwhile, in the 20th century, the leather strap was used in some English schools. Children were either hit across the hands or the backside.
The first country to abolish corporal punishment in schools was Poland in No other country abolished it until the 20th century. What did religion have to do with right and wrong? Anyway, I prayed. And my prayers were answered! No-one came to the door looking for me. No-one snitched that I was at the fight. I got away with it. And I think teenagers are interested too. The book features Samuel, a free black boy living in the South.
In a moment of stress, Samuel makes a similar bargain to mine - though he does it to save his brother rather than himself. So the book is about how we come to believe the things we do — not only religious belief but also cultural. I wanted to know how plantation owners justified themselves and how the same God served both master and slave.
The ban on corporal punishment came into force in in British state schools private schools took a while longer: until in England and Wales, in Scotland and in Northern Ireland.
Thirty years later and it feels like history, something children will only come across in books. Why I'm glad corporal punishment is now only found in books.
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