Tag Archives: smacking ban

Caron Lindsay

Cole-Hamilton’s pride as Scotland passes smacking ban

By Caron Lindsay | Thu 3rd October 2019 - 7:45 pm

If Alex Cole-Hamilton were to slap me, he would, rightly, face the full force of the law. If he were to slap his 5 year old daughter Darcy (which would never happen), he could do so with the full support of the law, which allows “reasonable chastisement.”

That is an inconsistency that he has been campaigning against for years. Today his work and that of many others was rewarded when the Scottish Parliament voted to give children the same protection from assault in law as adults, becoming the first country in the UK to do so.

I’ve known Alex for almost two decades. In that time I’ve teased him on many occasions, always with justification. But there have been many more times when I have been proud of him and today is one of the biggest. One of the reasons I spent a decade trying to get him elected was that I knew he would be an amazing advocate for Scotland’s children.

He’s been working to change the law on physical punishment of children for a long time. And he had an uphill battle trying to change party policy. In 2013, we lost by just 9 votes. Three years later, the result went the opposite way – and overwhelmingly. The proposer of the amendment in favour of keeping the law as it is changed his mind during the course of the debate, persuaded by the arguments. This move ensured Lib Dem support for the Bill today.

Today’s Bill was originally brought by Green MSP John Finnie but it had cross party support across Holyrood – except from the Conservatives, of course.

Here is Alex’s speech in favour of the Bill.

Continue reading »
Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , and | 3 Comments
Advert

Recent Comments

  • Tim
    Here is my answer - (600 words ish) - originally appeared in The Economist, reprinted by permission - https://timleunig.substack.com/p/what-to-do-about-fiscal-r...
  • George Thomas
    Residency can become more complex. For example, if my hypothetical sibling is working for the British armed forces stationed abroad but wants to donate to the L...
  • Chloe
    What your up against is voter apathy. So many only turn out to vote in a GE . Mayoral election turnouts hover around 30%. That's on a par with pcc's and in the ...
  • Jana
    I understand why some people believe we need to prevent Reform from getting donations that would allow it to match or even exceed the spending of the main parti...
  • Mohammed Amin
    I agree with David Vigar. While parts of the media have always had poor editorial standards. Conversely the BBC used to be quite good, but has declined signi...