Violation of Code of Ethics by The Times

We wish to bring to your attention an article published on the front-page of The Times on 11 January 2017. The hard copy headline was: ‘Pupils prefer the pain’. The strapline underneath read: ‘Corporal punishment “understood and accepted”’. The article was also published online with the headline: ‘Some pupils would rather get a smack at school than have their parents called in’. The online article continued with the following statement: ‘Pupils would rather be beaten than have their parents called in to be lectured by a teacher, a new study shows. This, and the lack of political will to enforce the law, is why corporal punishment continues to be inflicted in schools 20 years after it was outlawed.’