Editorial

Going on the "start them young" principle, the Commissioner for Children, Carmen Zammit has toured schools with a simple message for pupils about a few of their basic human rights, such as to a family life, to a proper education, to healthcare. These are set forth in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, promulgated 20 years ago and whose anniversary the tour celebrated.

In a league of countries where such rights are respected, Malta would rank fairly high. One it does not recognise however - along with most other countries - is for a child not to be subjected to corporal punishment in the home. Article 19 requires states to protect children from "all forms of physical and mental violence" in the care of parents and others. The UN committee which upholds and interprets the convention maintains that physical punishment within the family is incompatible with the convention and has recommended that all countries legally prohibit it. Two dozen mostly European countries have done so. Ms Zammit would like to follow suit but Malta's law still allows parents to hit their children on the basis of "reasonable chastisement", a principle that has come in for particular criticism by the committee.

The issue was recently raised by a British legal expert invited here to address a seminar on the subject. Among her main arguments was that the "reasonable chastisement" clause allows the fine line between a smack and physical abuse to be easily crossed and that if women are protected from such maltreatment, so too should children. Scorn and opprobrium were poured on her in ensuing reactions to the report that appeared on The Times.

Her arguments are perfectly reasonable. And there are plenty of other compelling ones too: hitting a child only teaches him/her to hit, increasing the chances of resorting to violence in later life. If the object is discipline, it doesn't work or, at least, not as well as other forms of punishment that do not entail physical hurt. It actually erodes respect for parents and it can impair a child's healthy development.

Proponents of a "ban on smacking" are not advocating that parents should be prosecuted for minor infractions, indeed quite the opposite. Neither are they saying: Do not discipline your children, as the British expert has been misinterpreted as saying. But they see such a legislative measure as fundamental to provoking a cultural shift away from corporal punishment, unacceptable from a rights perspective, to other methods of discipline.

Some of today's adults may recall being "chastised" with the palm of a hand, belt or wooden spoon and reason that it never did them any harm.

But the truth is that there are arguably more effective ways of disciplining children and forming their character, of teaching them through the negative consequences of their actions, which are more humane, compassionate and respectful of their dignity... and their established rights.

Malta has only one course of action to take and that is eventually to follow in the footsteps of the growing number of countries that have already implemented a ban on corporal punishment in the family, just as it has banned it in schools and outlawed domestic violence in the past. That would have to be preceded by a public education campaign on how to discipline children in a "positive" manner. That alone would do both children and the country a world of good. And, perhaps, next time Malta celebrates the convention, it will have introduced it in full.