Who is a child?

The Joint Select Committee reviewing the Jamaica Teaching Council Bill has been forced to seek advice from the Attorney General’s Chambers after concerns were raised about how the term ‘child’ was defined.

The bill defines a child as a person who has not attained the age of 18 years.

But a late submission from the Youth Advisory Council of Jamaica flagged the definition, warning that some students may not be covered under the bill amid the introduction of the Ministry of Education’s Sixth-Form Pathways programme.

It is part of the ministry’s implementation of a seven-year high-school programme that allows for students who complete grade 11 to enrol and pursue a two-year course of study with alternative opportunities alongside the traditional sixth-form curriculum.

This means that there will be students older than 18 years in the classroom.

Natalie Campbell-Rodriques halted the committee’s review of the matrix of submissions for the bill on Thursday when she pointed to the Youth Advisory Council’s recommendation for the definition of child to be amended to state ‘a person who has not attained the age of 20 years’.

However, committee chair Fayval Williams, who is also the minister of education, cautioned that the definition in the bill is consistent with other pieces of legislation and could not be changed.

“My daughter turned 18 in the sixth form, and she was one of the youngest, and with the extended time in schools, we’re going to have students who are 18 and older. So we have to be mindful,” Campbell-Rodriques rebutted.

She said that the concerns raised require that the committee audit the bill to see whether child and student are used interchangeably.

Campbell-Rodriques arbitrarily fingered Section 30(4)(c) of the bill in making the point that the recommendation was not without merit, but at the same time, suggested that student could be substituted for child.

The term child is referenced approximately 20 times in the 81-page bill based on a Gleaner search.

Section 30(4)(c) stipulates that the Jamaica Teaching Council should mandate that before registering, licensing, or authorising a person to teach, the individual should give written notice of any dismissal or resignation from any job in response to allegations of improper conduct relating to a child.

“This is why we’re saying that we have to look at the definition. It’s either we’re going to change the definition of child or remove it altogether because it will create a lacuna.

“In the section that Senator [Campbell-Rodriques] mentioned, it would mean that that particular clause would not cover students,” committee member Tova Hamilton argued.

Legal officer for the ministry, Anastasia Gordon-Jones, subsequently revealed that a team was reviewing the bill to see what adjustments could be made in referencing child versus student.

Committee member Kavan Gayle said that the concerns were legitimate but noted that certain definitions in law must remain consistent.

“The definition of a worker must remain consistent throughout legislation, and so the definition of a child also must remain consistent in legislation. So I’m glad the technical team will scour the bill to determine whether or not we utilise the term student as it relates to this particular legislation,” he said.

However, attorney-at-law representing the chief parliamentary counsel Dawn Douglas Shurland noted that the matter was not as simple as a substitution.

“I think we need to solicit the help of the Attorney General’s Chambers to assess this matter because one of the tenets on which the bill is built is the best interest of the child. So a solution is not simply changing child to student; it may not be. So we have to do an assessment,” she said.

Williams said that the matter would be referred to the attorney general.

kimone.francis@gleanerjm.com