B

Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)

Speaking in the House of Lords on 16 June 2026

Debate

Children: Physical Punishment

Contribution

The noble Baroness is right to draw attention to that terrible case, and to the requirement, whenever we are faced with tragedies such as that, to learn the right lessons about how we need to reform the system. On her particular point about workers, one of the ways that we improve the way in which social workers and others, whether agency or otherwise, work is to increase their capacity, to focus them, as we are doing, on neglect and abuse, and to improve their training. We will continue to do that while, of course, learning the lessons from tragedies such as the one that she has identified today.

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