Lawmaker calls for passage of anti-corporal punishment law

A PARTY-LIST lawmaker called Tuesday for the immediate passage of the bill outlawing all forms of corporal punishment on minors following a report that a public school teacher in Cebu forced her students to eat paper.

Reports said a mathematics teacher in Paknaan National High School in Mandaue City forced her students to swallow scraps of paper when she found out that nobody among them followed her instruction to do their seatwork.

While an investigation is already being conducted by both the Department of Education and Commission on Human Rights, Bagong Henerasyon party-list Representative Bernadette Herrera-Dy called for Senate action over the measure prohibiting kicking, hitting, slapping, beating, and lashing to any part of a child's body.

"The Paknaan paper eating incident is not rare. Many of our children suffer from harsh and unusual punishment which parents and their elders believe are effective ways of disciplining them," the lawmaker said.

Dy noted that the teacher's action is punishable under the House Bill (HB) 4455 or the "Positive and Non-Violent Discipline on Children Act," which was already approved on third reading by the House of Representatives.

Corporal punishment refers to cruel and unusual acts that subject the child to indignities and other excessive chastisement that embarrasses or humiliates the child. It includes physical punishment and is imposed by an adult or by another child to discipline, train or control the victim.

Dy, vice chairperson of the House committee on welfare of children, has been batting for the swift approval of HB 4455 as she noted that studies conducted by various international and local agencies "show that corporal punishment is ineffective in disciplining children." (Kathrina Alvarez/Sunnex)