Good morning, everyone. Welcome to the Children, Young People and Education Committee this morning. We've received no apologies for absence. Can I ask if there are any declarations of interest from Members, please? No. Okay, thank you. Item 2 this morning is the Children (Abolition of Defence of Reasonable Punishment) (Wales) Bill: Stage 2 proceedings. I'm pleased to welcome Julie Morgan AM, Deputy Minister for Health and Social Services; Karen Cornish, deputy director, children and families division at Welsh Government; and Emma Gammon, lawyer for Welsh Government. Thank you for attending this morning and welcome to the committee. I'm just going to run through the procedures that we're going to follow now. As I said, the purpose of the meeting is to undertake Stage 2 proceedings on the Children (Abolition of Defence of Reasonable Punishment) (Wales) Bill. For these proceedings, Members should have copies of the marshalled list of amendments, the groupings of the amendments for debate and the voting order for the amendments. The marshalled list of amendments is the list of all amendments tabled, marshalled into the order in which the sections appear in the Bill. The order in which we consider amendments will be the default order—that is, sections 1 to 3 and the long title. You will see from the groupings list that amendments have been grouped to facilitate debate. However, the order in which they're called and moved for decision is dictated by the marshalled list. Members will, therefore, need to follow the two papers, although I will advise Members when I call them whether they're being called to speak in the debate or to move their amendments for a decision. There will be one debate on each group of amendments. Members who wish to speak in a particular group should indicate to me in the usual way. I will call the Deputy Minister to speak on each group. For the record, in accordance with the convention agreed by the Business Committee, as Chair I will move amendments in the name of the Deputy Minister. For expediency, I will assume that the Deputy Minister wishes me to move all of her amendments, and I will do so at the appropriate place in the marshalled list. Deputy Minister, if you do not want a particular amendment to be moved, please indicate to me at the relevant point in proceedings. In line with our usual practice, legal advisers to the committee and the Deputy Minister are not expected to provide advice on the record. If Members wish to seek legal advice during proceedings, please do so by passing a note to the legal adviser and, if necessary, we can adjourn. My intention is to try to dispose of all amendments during today's meeting. I will call a short break in proceedings at an appropriate time, if necessary. Okay, thank you. So, we will proceed, then, to group 1, which is the duty to promote public awareness. The lead amendment in the group is amendment 1 in the name of the Deputy Minister. I move amendment 1 in the Deputy Minister's name and call on the Deputy Minister to speak to her amendment and the other amendments in this group.
Thank you very much, Chair. My amendments 1 and 4 will place a duty on Welsh Ministers to provide information and increase awareness about the change in the law to ensure that the public are made aware of how the law will change as a result of the defence of reasonable punishment being abolished and that physical punishment would be prohibited once the Act commences. I tabled these amendments in response to this committee's recommendation—this was a recommendation from this committee in the Stage 1 report, so I have responded to that. I've already made a commitment to a high-intensity awareness-raising campaign over approximately six years from Royal Assent, should the Bill be passed. I've considered amendments 1A to 1E, which have been tabled by Janet Finch-Saunders, and which relate to the duty to raise awareness. Amendment 1A introduces a reference to public understanding. We don't think, actually, that this adds anything to the Government amendment, which already mentions awareness. It makes the awareness-raising duty open-ended with no time limit, which is not necessary. By commencement, messaging around the change in the law will be embedded. The awareness-raising campaign will continue for a number of years. Therefore, an ongoing duty referring specifically to the law change would not be required. I understand, of course, that the awareness-raising campaign needs to be comprehensive, well planned and to reach out to all those people and all those communities who need to be aware of the law change, and understand how to respond to it. But I don't think it's helpful or necessary to highlight specific groups, such as visitors to Wales, on the face of the Bill—that's the approach taken in amendment 1E—as it risks placing too much emphasis on certain groups at the expense of others. In relation to children, the committee will know that I'm fully committed to children’s rights, and that Welsh Ministers are already under a duty to have due regard to the rights of children whenever they exercise their functions. An additional due regard requirement, such as the one set out in amendment 1D, relating specifically to the need to promote awareness among children is not needed. This would be part and parcel of the Welsh Government approach to putting children’s rights at the heart of our policy making. Similarly, I don't think it's necessary for the Bill to set out specifically the topics that need to be covered in the awareness-raising campaign, as is suggested in amendments 1B and 1C. That level of detail, I don't think, is for the face of the Bill. Information required about parenting support will be considered by the parenting expert group, under the auspices of the Bill’s strategic implementation group, working with my officials and the expert stakeholder group on the awareness-raising campaign. And, really, their thinking should not be constrained in any way by specifications on the face of the Bill. I think we always need to bear in mind that what the Bill does is remove a defence to an existing criminal offence; it does not create a new offence. And in this context, it doesn't make sense for this Bill to contain a provision requiring the provision of information about how a person may raise concerns if it appears to them that a child is being physically punished. As I set out in my letter to this committee responding to recommendation 15 on this point, safeguarding is everyone’s business, and, as now, the public have a role in highlighting to relevant services if they are concerned about a child. I'm asking for the support of Members for amendments 1 and 4, and I ask Members to reject amendments 1A to 1E because this would place unnecessary provisions on the face of the Bill.
Thank you, Deputy Minister. Are there other Members who wish to speak? Janet Finch-Saunders.