- Nearly 20 per cent of respondents said they had witnessed children being beaten, slapped, or verbally humiliated by parents or carers, survey finds
- City set to enact new child protection law, under which childcare professionals will be held accountable if they fail to report suspected abuse cases within reasonable time
Nearly one in five people in Hong Kong have witnessed children being punished physically or verbally. Photo: ShutterstockMore than 70 per cent of Hongkongers will not get involved if they see a child being smacked or excessively scolded in public, a charity has found, and is urging the government to set up a mandatory reporting mechanism of suspected abuse cases as soon as possible.
The findings were released with the city set to enact a new child protection law, under which childcare professionals will be held accountable if they fail to report suspected abuse cases within a reasonable time, amid a string of scandals in recent years.
The Labour and Welfare Bureau is expected to introduce a bill to the Legislative Council in the first half of this year. The government has proposed that the offence will be punishable by up to three months in jail and a HK$5,000 (US$637) fine.
But people seem reluctant to intervene when a child is physically punished in public.
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According to a Save the Children survey conducted from September to October last year, close to 20 per cent of the 1,008 respondents said they had witnessed children being beaten, slapped, or verbally humiliated by their parents or carers in the past 12 months.
Of those, just 23 per cent took action, including comforting the children, dissuading the punishers or calling police, with most respondents saying they were reluctant to intervene in other families’ affairs.
Some respondents said they were unsure whether the incident constituted child abuse, or thought it was not that serious.
“Once a child suffers from physical and mental harm inflicted by their parents or carers, this is no longer a family affair, the public should understand this,” said Ian Li, advocacy manager at the charity.
“Such a mindset will delay the identification of child abuse cases, and subsequently do more harm to the child victim.”
Although close to half of the respondents thought corporal punishment was not common in today’s Hong Kong, the number of child abuse cases indeed increased by 45 per cent from 2020 to 2021, when the Covid-19 pandemic hit the city.
A survey conducted by the charity in 2021 found that close to 40 per cent of youngsters were worried about being kicked out of their homes.
Li said the discrepancy reflected that the public, including parents, might have underestimated the severity and impact of corporal punishment.
Sylvia Chung Yim-hung, chairwoman of the Division of Counselling Psychology of Hong Kong, said using corporal punishment in public was a sign the person had run out of measures or had the mentality to take care of the child.
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Chung advised people to distract the punishers first when witnessing such incidents and to separate the two parties so they could calm down.
They could then try to suggest some alternatives to help the punishers deal with the child’s behaviour, she said, and seek help from police or social workers when necessary.
Sophia Ku, 40, a mother of four young children, said she hoped more resources could be made available on teaching positive parenting.
“It’s not easy to control your emotions when you are facing tremendous stress, you can easily be affected by your children’s temper and lose it,” Ku said, adding she wished more childcare services were available to give parents a break from the pressure.
Save the Children spokeswoman Winnie Ng said: “Corporal punishment does not necessarily constitutes child abuse, but it will surely increase the risk for serious abuse cases.”
Ng urged the authorities to push ahead with the mandatory reporting legislation as soon as possible, saying the policy had found overwhelming support in the survey.
All parties in society should also step up education efforts on positive, non-violent parenting, and subsequently build a culture with zero tolerance for violence against minors, she added.