Petition Remove the legal defence of Reasonable Punishment from English law.

Scotland and Wales are making legislative changes which will give children full and equal protection from harm. In England it is currently permissible to hit a child on the grounds of reasonable punishment, not only is this practice physically harmful, it also damages brain development.

More details

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3447048/

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3768154/

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/great-kids-great-parents/201806/physical-punishment-and-violence

https://theconversation.com/research-shows-smacking-makes-children-more-aggressive-and-at-risk-of-mental-health-problems-83394

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/12/131211103958.htm

This petition closed early because of a General Election Find out more on the Petitions Committee website

241 signatures

Show on a map

10,000

Date closed 6 November 2019
Get petition data (json format)

About petition data

The data shows the number of people who have signed the petition by country as well as in the constituency of each Member of Parliament. This data is available for all petitions on the site. It is not a list of people who have signed the petition. The only name that is shared on the site is that of the petition creator.