Doctors are calling for a ban on the “Victorian-era punishment” of smacking children over concerns that it causes significant harm. The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH) wants MPs to back an amendment to the Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill which would remove the "reasonable punishment" defence from English law.

Professor Andrew Rowland, a consultant paediatrician and RCPCH officer for child protection, said parents should discipline their children “in a way that doesn't involve violence”. Children who experience physical punishment are more than twice as likely to experience serious physical assault and abuse, according to the RCPCH. Prof Rowland said: “If we want to stop that, the first step has got to be to remove the defence of reasonable punishment.

"That will make it easier - easier for people like me as a paediatrician working in child protection services, for social workers, for police officers, to draw a line and say there are never any circumstances involved where physical punishment of children is ever legal.

"Let's move forward from that and help families to find a way to modify their children's behaviour, to help them grow up happily, healthily and safe from harm in a way that doesn't involve violence."

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.

Prof Rowland said the same defence had been around since 1860 but the “best scientific evidence” suggests smacking “undoubtedly harms children's health on a population basis”.

A 2021 study by University College London found that children who experienced harsh parenting including being smacked at the age of three are more likely to suffer from poor mental health and have behavioural problems by their mid-teens.

Some 67 countries around the world have already adopted smacking bans — including Scotland — with a further 20 committing to do so, Prof Rowland added.

He said: “There have been no robust scientific studies that have shown that physical punishment of children has any positive effect.

"So it's not just that the use of it harms children, it also doesn't benefit them in any way whatsoever."

Calls to introduce a smacking ban intensified after the death of 10-year-old Sara Sharif. She was murdered in August 2023 after a two-year "campaign of torture" at the hands of her father and stepmother.

Asked about the case, Prof Rowland said: "What happened to Sara was absolutely horrendous, and I can say that as a paediatrician, but also as a member of the public, that no child should suffer as Sara suffered.

"But I understand there's going to be an inquiry. It would be premature for any organisation to prejudice the outcome of that inquiry."

A poll of 3,500 adults in England carried out by YouGov on behalf of the NSPCC in January 2024 found 71% thought smacking, hitting, slapping, or shaking a child was not acceptable.

Prof Rowland added that the opportunity for change is "right now. If it's not now, there is a real risk that there won't be time throughout the remainder of this Parliament to bring in the legislation that children need, that they deserve, and actually that they're entitled to. So this has to be the moment to act."