Committee Reports > List of Committees > Dáil > 1997 > Select Committtee on Social Affairs > Report - Report of the Select Committee on Social Affairs on Non-Fatal Offences against the Person in respect of Children

Appendix 3: Draft Bill: Non-Fatal Offences against the Person in Respect of Children

________________________

BILLE NA LEANAÍ, 1997 CHILDREN BILL, 1997

________________________

ARRANGEMENT OF SECTIONS

1.Short title

2.Commencement

3.Interpretation

4.Repeals

5.Cruelty to children

6.Defence of reasonable chastisement

7.Abolition of sentence to whipping

________________________

Acts Referred to

Offences Against the Person Act, 1861

Summary Jurisdiction over Children (Ireland) Act, 1884

Children Act, 1908

________________________

BELLE NA LEANAÍ, 1997 CHILDREN BILL, 1997

________________________

Draft of

BILL

entitled

AN ACT FOR THE PROTECTION OF CHILDREN FROM CRUELTY AND TO PROVIDE FOR RELATED MATTERS

BE IT ENACTED BY THE OIREACHTAS AS FOLLOWS:

1.—This Act may be cited as the Children Act, 1997.

2.—This Act shall come into operation on such day or days as by order or orders made by the Minister under this section, may be fixed either generally or with reference to any particular purpose or provision, and different days may be so fixed for different purposes and different provisions.

3.—For the purposes of this Act, “child” means a person under the age of 18 years unless the context otherwise requires.

4.—The enactments specified in column (1) of the Schedule are hereby repealed to the extent specified in column (2) of that Schedule.

Cruelty to Children

5.—(1) It shall be an offence for any person who has the custody, charge, care or control of a child to assault, sexually assault, ill-treat, neglect, abandon or expose that child to danger or cause or procure or allow the child to be assaulted, sexually assaulted, ill-treated, neglected, abandoned or exposed to danger in a manner likely to cause unnecessary suffering or injury to the child’s health (including physical, mental or emotional health) or seriously affect the wellbeing of the child.

(2) A person found guilty of an offence under this section shall be liable -

(a) on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding £1,000 or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 1 year, or both, or

(b) on conviction on indictment to a fine not exceeding £10,000 or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 10 years, or both.

(3) For the purpose of this section, a person shall be deemed to have neglected a child in a manner likely to cause injury to the child’s health (including physical, mental or emotional health) if that person has failed to provide adequate food, clothing, medical aid or lodging for the child.

(4) For the purposes of this section, “ill-treatment” shall include frightening, bulling or threatening behaviour towards a child.

(5) A person does not contravene this section by virtue of anything done for reasons that include averting an immediate danger of personal injury to the child concerned or any other person or an immediate danger to the property of any person.

(6) An offence under this section shall be referred to as an offence of cruelty and shall be a felony.

Defence of Reasonable Chastisement

6.— Any rule of law which conferred a defence on any person including a parent, legal guardian, teacher or other person having the lawful control or charge of a child in respect of chastisement of that child is hereby abolished.

Abolition of whipping

7.—No person shall be sentenced by a court to whipping and, so far as any enactment confers power on a court to pass a sentence of whipping, it shall cease to have effect.

SCHEDULE