I’ve been meaning to write about a startle in a TV show a couple of weeks back, hosted by comedian Sean Locke. I scribbled his comment down, as it deserved a wider audience amongst perverts like us. Making a smacking gesture, he observed:
“I’d like to see a programme called ‘Tough Nuts’, in which you take kids with behavioural problems and fly them away to a country where you’re still allowed to give them a good clout,”
That led to a most vivid dream later that night, of a distinguished public school in some faraway outpost. Girls in blazers and straw boaters wandered across immaculately manicured lawns in blazing sunshine, whilst the continuing threat (and regular use) of the cane kept them strictly in order.
I googled the subject, as one would. Hansard column 857W, 1 February 2005, is the place to turn to satisfy your academic curiosity. ‘Mr. Dawson had asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether corporal punishment of children has been prohibited by legislation in schools in each of the UK overseas territories’. (Why on earth did he want to know?) (Hi, Mr. Dawson!).
The minister, Mr. Alexander, listed six such territories where traditional British remedies still hold sway. In Anguilla, “under the Education Act, corporal punishment is allowed in schools under controlled conditions.” In Bermuda, “there is no prohibition on corporal punishment in schools”, whilst in the British Virgin Islands, “corporal punishment can be carried out by the principal, deputy principal or by one senior teacher appointed in writing.”
The Turks and Caicos Islands permit corporal punishment in schools “provided that it is not administered in a manner which is degrading or injurious”. The Falkland Islands bans corporal punishment in public sector schools, but not in the private sector; fortunately for abolishionists, there are no private sector schools!
The Cayman Islands, though, caught my eye:
Corporal punishment is allowed by law in all public and private schools in the Cayman Islands, only where no other punishment is considered suitable or effective by the principal, and may only be administered by the principal or any teacher appointed in writing by the principal for that purpose. An entry must be made in a punishment book kept in each school.
I’m genuinely not a member of the “bring back the birch brigade”, and would happily see the relevant laws in each country changed tomorrow. I can clearly differentiate between fantasy and reality, between consent and its unacceptable absence. But this stuff is wonderful as a basis for future scenes and stories!