Murder of ten-year-old Sara Sharif leads to renewed calls for smacking ban
1 May 2025, 00:30
The UK's children's commissioners have called for a wholesale smacking ban, describing the current situation where there is a legal defence in some nations as "outdated and morally repugnant".
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Wales made any type of corporal punishment, including smacking, hitting, slapping and shaking, illegal in March 2022 while Scotland introduced a similar ban in November 2020.
But it is not completely outlawed in England and Northern Ireland.
According to the Children Act 2004, it is unlawful to hit your child, except where it is "reasonable punishment", and this is judged on a case-by-case basis.
The murder of 10-year-old Sara Sharif in 2023 led to renewed calls from campaigners for a total ban across the UK.
The girl's father Urfan Sharif claimed in a call to police after fleeing England that he "did legally punish" his daughter and that he "beat her up too much".
He and Sara's stepmother Beinash Batool were jailed for life in December 2024 for Sara's murder.
'Haunted'
Children's Commissioner for England Dame Rachel said: "I am haunted by the words of Sara Sharif's abusive father that he 'legally punished her' until she died.
"Let this be Sara's legacy, that all children in the United Kingdom are given the same protection as anyone else."
The commissioners made their pleas as the Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill was set to return to Parliament on Thursday for its second reading in the House of Lords.
A joint statement from Dame Rachel, alongside her counterparts Rocio Cifuentes for Wales, Nicola Killean for Scotland and Chris Quinn in Northern Ireland, insisted "loving, well-meaning" parents have no need to be concerned about a change in the law.
They said: "As Children's Commissioners we are united in our view that any defence in law that permits assault for the purpose of physical punishment of children is outdated and morally repugnant.
"The experience of Scotland and Wales, where children are already offered full protection from assault and violence, does not suggest any increase in parents and carers being criminalised - no loving, well-meaning parent has anything to fear from a defence to assault being removed from the law."
Earlier this year education minister Stephen Morgan said while the UK Government was "looking closely" at legal changes made in Wales and Scotland, it had "no plans to legislate at this stage" for England.
Mr Morgan said the Government wanted to "look at the evidence" before taking such a "significant legislative step".
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In March the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH) said smacking children should be consigned to the history books, adding that it puts children at risk of "really significant physical harm" and is a "Victorian" punishment.
Meanwhile national school attendance charity School-Home Support, said it is calling for the Bill to require a whole family support worker for every school, describing this as the "missing piece in the Government's approach to absence".
Data published in March suggested the number of pupils in England absent for long periods of time reached a record high last year.
Department for Education (DfE) data indicated that 2.3% of pupils were "severely absent", which means they missed at least 50% of possible school sessions in 2023/24, compared with 2.0% in 2022/23.
Overall, 171,269 pupils were classed as severely absent last academic year, up from 150,256 in 2022/23.
It is the highest number recorded since the current DfE data began in 2006/07.
