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Further implications
Though the scientific debate still sputters on, the growing bulk of clinical opinion in Australia and among medical authorities around the world appears to be that physically punishing children risks creating life-long psychological, social, and cognitive problems. Despite this, the issue seems a long way from being resolved. Though 70 nations have now outlawed 'spanking' or 'smacking' children, most of the world has not, and this includes major liberal democracies such as the United States, England, and Canada.
Part of the remaining issue appears to be that a total prohibition of physical punishment seems too extreme for some countries. Not all accept medical authorities' claims that every physical punishment runs the risk of causing children significant harm.
According to these claims, among Australian children who were physically punished as rarely as four times in their lives up to the age of 24, there is a discernably increased incidence of psychological and social harm. These findings echo those of a 2018 United States data review which claimed, 'Acceptable physical punishment and unacceptable physical abuse...are linked with the same detrimental outcomes for children, just to varying degrees. Euphemisms such as "spanking" have obscured the fact that both physical punishment and physical abuse involve hitting and hurting children emotionally and physically.' Despite, or perhaps because of the scope of such claims, lingering doubts remain in the public mind. Just what is harmful physical punishment? There is popular skepticism that punishment as slight as 'a little tap on the hand' or an infrequent 'smack on the bum' could cause enduring harm that manifests in adulthood. Examples of this view are presented by the hosts on the Central Coast radio breakfast program 'Breakfast with Paddy & Rob Palmer' in a segment broadcast on October 13, 2022.
Despite current popular reluctance, there are, however, some practical advantages to a total prohibition. Removing all questions of definition makes a law change easy to enact. This is shown in the case of Wales, where after the country's new corporal punishment law came into force, all physical punishment of children was outlawed. Justifying its new law, the Welsh government stated, 'All physical punishment is illegal in Wales. Children have the same protection from assault as adults. This means the law is clear - easy for children, parents, professionals, and the public to understand.'
Apart from the apparent ease of implementation, there is another advantage to the total prohibition of childhood physical punishment. It removes the defence of 'reasonable chastisement' which allows some Australian parents to abuse their children without legal consequence. Currently, in Australia, there are two levels of legislation that seek to protect children from abuse. There is civil child protection law which focuses on whether a child needs to be safeguarded from future harm (as in being temporarily removed from the family home) and there is criminal child protection law which focuses on establishing the guilt of offenders against children and imposing punishment. Civil law requires a lower level of proof, but under both forms of law it is difficult to establish that child abuse has occurred.
Defenders of a ban on any violence against children argue that this makes it far easier to act against child abuse. The First Minister of Wales, Mark Drakeford, claims that ensuring children's right to be protected against abuse is a major benefit of the new Welsh law. He has stated, 'That right is now enshrined in Welsh law - no more grey areas, no more "defence of reasonable punishment". That is all in the past.' The same point has been made by an interviewer from Mercator Net, an online public affairs and ethics magazine based in the United States. The interviewer asked, 'There is...an alarming amount of child physical abuse in some quarters of society. Isn't it worth banning physical discipline altogether for the sake of children vulnerable to real abuse?" Ultimately is appears likely that Australia will go the way of Wales, Scotland and 68 other nations that have banned the physical punishment of children. This is because popular support for such punishment seems to be waning. The 2019 Australia Talks National Survey found that almost half of Australians (47 percent) believed it was acceptable to physically punish children, whilst 38 per cent disagreed. The survey also found that more older participants agreed that smacking was an acceptable form of discipline.
In June 2022, recent survey findings showed that less than 40 per cent of the 65+ age group among those who were surveyed support smacking and other forms of corporal punishment as a form of discipline for children and that as the age of respondents dropped, so did their support for smacking. Among those aged between 16 and 24 support was just under 15 percent.