Britain is one of the most unfriendly countries for children in the world, the Children’s Commissioner told the Church of England yesterday.
Prof Sir Albert Aynsley Green said Britain did not even give children the same level of legal protection from violence as adults and urged the Church to become their advocates.
Speaking at the opening of the Church’s General Synod in York, expressed concerns about the use of physical restraint in youth prisons after the recent deaths of two inmates.
He criticised proposed changes to the rules that may broaden the grounds on which physical restraint can lawfully be used against children and young people.
For the sake of US readers, I ought to explain that Asbos stand for Anti-social behaviour order and they impose conditions, such as curfews, on out of control people, usually early teens, whom it would be tragic to jail but who are making life absolute misery for the people who live around them. An Asbo is in effect a last chance warning. A kid with an Asbo will typically have been swearing at neighbours, damaging their cars, hurling racist abuse, all fuelled by drugs and copious under-age drink. I notice that this expert does not tell us what should be done as an alternative. One thing we may be sure and certain about: he himself does not live in an area plagued by destrucutvely anti-social children.
“Britain is one of the most unfriendly countries for children in the world, the Children’s Commissioner told the Church of England yesterday.”
Seems implausible.