Letters | Hong Kong child abuse reports show city failing as protector: act now before more little ones are hurt
- The first level of defence is to ensure parents do not abuse their children, by training them to raise a family with love instead of violence
Children coming from vulnerable backgrounds are more prone to experience child abuse. Our system needs to identify these high-risk parents as early as possible to ensure they and their children receive proper guidance and protection.
Thirdly, we need our children to learn to protect themselves, both from strangers and their trusted families, teachers and friends. This is an area of great challenge, as we need to ensure that the teachings do not compromise the natural trust children have towards people who are supposed to take care of them and protect them.
Last but not least, we need a legal system that effectively deters all forms of child abuse. Many countries have already introduced laws to ban corporal punishment. For some traditional parents, particularly in Asian countries, corporal punishment is still a common form of discipline to “teach” their children. Our current legislative framework in Hong Kong lacks a consolidated children’s bill and law prohibiting corporal punishment inflicted by parents. We should conduct research and engage in public discourse to explore and study whether enacting a ban on corporal punishment and increasing the penalties on perpetrators of child abuse would make sense.
Research has clearly shown that victims of child abuse suffer long-term psychological and emotional scars. It is time now to step up our efforts to protect our children who can’t speak for themselves yet already hold the key to our collective future.
Amy Fong, chief executive, Save the Children Hong Kong