{"id":4010,"date":"2023-07-07T07:16:39","date_gmt":"2023-07-07T07:16:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/safeguardinghub.co.uk\/?p=4010"},"modified":"2023-07-28T18:01:36","modified_gmt":"2023-07-28T18:01:36","slug":"age-related-milestones-relevant-to-safeguarding-children-a-guide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/safeguardinghub.co.uk\/age-related-milestones-relevant-to-safeguarding-children-a-guide\/","title":{"rendered":"Age related milestones relevant to safeguarding children"},"content":{"rendered":"
This guide looks at the various ages for children that have some relevance to safeguarding.<\/p>\n
Overview <\/strong><\/p>\n The legal definition of a child in England, Wales and Northern Ireland is someone who has not yet reached their 18th birthday. On reaching 18 a person legally becomes an adult. In Scotland the principle is generally the same. However, in some legal proceedings a child can be defined as a person under 16 years of age. Treating a person who is under 18 years as a child, is in keeping with Article 1 of the United Nations Convention of the Rights of the Child which states that \u201ca<\/em> child means every human being below the age of eighteen years unless under the law applicable to the child, majority is attained earlier\u201d.<\/em><\/p>\n Whilst in the eyes of the law the definition of a child is clear, there are many age-related laws, regulations and restrictions across the UK which may affect and impact on child safeguarding. Below we take a look at a number of areas and ages which have some relevance to safeguarding, even those with rather tenuous links.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Four popular things a person under 18 cant do:<\/p>\n Core Principle \u2013 Police have a duty under Section 11 of the Children Act 2004 \u201cto make arrangements to ensure that in discharging their functions, they have regard to the need to safeguard and promote the welfare of children\u201d<\/em>.<\/p>\n Definition of a child \u2013 Originally under the Police & Criminal Act (PACE) 1984, children or a young person were referred to as juveniles, being any person who was under the age 17 or who appeared to be under the age of 17. However, as of October 2015, Section 42 of the Criminal Justice and Courts Act 2015 extended the definition of \u2018juvenile\u2019 for the purposes of PACE to include any child or young person who appears to be under the age of 18.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n Children should not routinely be kept in the police station overnight, after they have been charged with a criminal offence. Children refused bail should be transferred from the police station to local authority accommodation. The legislation that covers this area is Section 38(6) Police and Criminal Evidence Act (PACE) 1984.<\/p>\n Where a child is arrested for an offence and subsequently charged, the custody officer, the officer in charge of a police custody area, can either grant the child bail to attend court, or refuse bail and keep the child in custody pending their first court appearance. The starting point for any custody officer is that any person, child or adult has a presumed right to bail. However, bail can be refused if there are reasonable grounds to believe that any of the following conditions apply:<\/p>\n The application to refuse bail and keep the person in custody is made by the officer(s) investigating the offence(s). The custody officer should be impartial when considering the above criteria, being mindful that they have a duty under Section 11 Children Act 2004 to safeguard and promote the welfare of all persons under the age of 18. Where bail is refused under 1 or more of the above criteria there is a duty placed on the custody officer to transfer the child to local authority accommodation, rather than keeping them in a police cell or detention room overnight. However, this doesn\u2019t have to take place where a custody officer certifies that:<\/p>\n If it is deemed impracticable to transfer a child, the custody officer must complete a Juvenile Detention Certificate which must then be produced to the court explaining why the transfer was not possible and child was kept in a police cell overnight.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n
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