Last week, Welsh parliament passed legislation to make it illegal to smack children.
Advocates for the move called it long overdue and celebrated that children now have the same legal protections against assault as adults. Critics, however, argued the ban stepped into the private lives of families and that the government was making criminals out of loving parents.
When the law comes into effect in 2022, Wales will join dozens of countries including Finland, Scotland, Austria, Norway, South Africa and Brazil to outlaw smacking.
Watch: Do you smack your kids?
But not Australia. It remains lawful here to smack a child, under certain conditions.
The philosophical debate, however, rages on… Is physical punishment actually effective discipline? What message does it send to the child? And what impact, if any, does it have on a person in the long term?
Let’s take a look.
What does Australian law say about smacking children?
Smacking is a kind of ‘corporal punishment’, which is a term used to describe physical force used for the purpose of control or correction.
Corporal punishment by a parent or carer is lawful in all Australian states and territories — and not considered child abuse — providing that it’s “reasonable”.
Top Comments
I willingly admit that I have smacked both of my children. Several times occurred when they were going through their biting phases and I had a choice to smack them, make them cry out and in crying out release their teeth from my body part that was being bitten, or to try to pry their jaw open to stop them biting me. Any other time has been when they have been so deep in a temper tantrum that they were about to harm themself and were unreachable verbally and a slight smack on their bottom has drawn them out enough to begin reasoning with them. In all of these times my options were very limited and I had to choose the option of least harm.
Do not criminalize parents on the advice of so called experts. The same experts whose advice on parenting seems to have had the consequences of a generation of young children with depression, anxiety and suicidal thoughts.