Perhaps I will have been proved wrong - but I doubt it. Every time this issue arises, MPs decide that the 'reasonable chastisement' defence should be preserved, and that children should not be afforded equal protection under the law from assault.
Meanwhile, the latest report from the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child (see News, page 3) has just called for the third time for corporal punishment, including smacking, to be prohibited in UK homes. This is just one of a host of criticisms of the UK's legal and social shortcomings regarding the treatment of children and young people.
The British tendency to demonise and jail children, exploit them in reality TV shows, and violate their rights to 'freedom of movement and peaceful assembly' comes in for severe censure from the UN.
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