Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to section 58 of the Children Act 2004, if she will take legislative steps to remove the defence of reasonable punishment for parents.

The landmark Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill, a key part of the government’s Plan for Change, represents the most transformative piece of child protection legislation in a generation, including wholesale reform of the children’s social care system and the introduction of measures to improve information sharing between education, police, health, justice and social workers to stop vulnerable children falling through the cracks.

While the department is looking closely at the impact of the legal changes made in Wales and Scotland in relation to reasonable punishment, we have no plans to legislate at this stage.