Lawfulness of corporal punishment

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Corporal punishment is lawful in the home.

Children have limited protection from violence and abuse under the Probation and Child Welfare Act (1994).

Schools

Corporal punishment is lawful in schools under the Education Act (2005), the Corporal Punishment Act (1967) and the common law disciplinary power of teachers. The Education Act allows for the use of corporal punishment as a last resort by the principal or any other teacher authorised by the principal to do so.

Penal system

The Corporal Punishment Act and section 103 of the Magistrate Code of Procedure (1961) permit young male offenders to be whipped up to 12 strokes as a sentence for crime. Lashes are usually administered by a policeman using a tree whip. The Constitution (1983) prohibits “inhuman or degrading punishment or other like treatment” (article 7) but also states that “nothing contained in or done under the authority of any law shall be held to be inconsistent with or in contravention of section 7 of the Constitution to the extent that the law in question authorizes the infliction of punishment that was lawful immediately before 27^th February 1967” (article 9, schedule 2). In February 2006, a 15-year old boy was reportedly sentenced to 10 lashes with a tamarind rod.

There is no prohibition of corporal punishment as a disciplinary measure in penal institutions.

Alternative care

There is no statutory provision prohibiting corporal punishment in alternative care settings, and the common law power to chastise may be exercised by a person acting in loco parentis. The Probation and Child Welfare Act (1994) applies. According to a Senior Lecturer at the Caribbean Child Development Centre, School of Continuing Studies, UWI, Mona, there is a policy against corporal punishment in early childhood centres, but this is not confirmed in law (Brown, J. (2000), “Early childhood investment in st kitts and nevis: a model for the caribbean?”, www.cavehill.uwi.edu/bnccde/sk&n/conference/papers/JBrown.html, accessed 22-2-07).

Workplace

No information.

Prevalence research

As part of a large scale ethnographic study reported in 1991, 349 children aged 9-16 were given questionnaires and information sheets concerning physical punishment and children and caretakers were interviewed. 61% of children (69% of caretakers) agreed with the statement “Beatings are a good and normal part of raising children”; 73% of children (86% of caretakers) agreed with “It is for children’s own good that parents beat them”; 67% of children (80% of caretakers) agreed “I know my mother loves me because she beats me”; 93% of caretakers believed that parents should beat their children for misbehaviour and 94% agreed with the statement “He who spares the rod spoils the child”. The frequency and severity of physical punishment (including slapping, spanking, cuffing, thumping, burning, shoving and beating with an implement) were also researched. Children reported being punished on average over four times in a two week period, though some reported being punished several times daily. Younger children and boys were punished more often and more severely than older children and girls. Higher socio-economic status caretakers punished children less frequently and less severely than lower status caretakers.
(Rohner, R. P., Kean, K. J. & Cournoyer, D. E. (1991), “Effects of corporal punishment, perceived caretaker warmth, and cultural beliefs on the psychological adjustment of children in St Kitts, West Indies”, Journal of Marriage and the Family, vol.53, pp.681-693)

Recommendations by human rights treaty bodies

Committee on the Rights of the Child

“The Committee remains gravely concerned that corporal punishment is still widely practised within the State party and that domestic legislation does not prohibit its use. In this regard, the Committee recommends that the State party take all appropriate measures, including of a legislative nature, to prohibit corporal punishment within school, the family, the juvenile justice and alternative care systems and generally within the society. It further suggests that awareness-raising campaigns be conducted to ensure that alternative forms of discipline are administered in a manner consistent with the child’s human dignity and in conformity with the Convention, especially article 28.2.

“While the Committee notes the establishment of a national committee to regulate the use of corporal punishment within the juvenile justice system, it remains gravely concerned that the Corporal Punishment Act (1967) continues to allow the corporal punishment of a male juvenile convicted of an offence and to empower the magistrate’s court to order a juvenile convicted of an offence to be “whipped”. The Committee recommends that the State party take all necessary measures to prohibit the use of corporal punishment within the juvenile justice system, including the repeal of the Corporal Punishment Act (1967).”
(24 August 1999, CRC/C/15/Add.104, Concluding observations on initial report, paras.20 and 32)