Children in conflict with law

THE much talked about propos­al in the House of Representa­tives about lowering the “age of criminal responsibility” from 15 to nine now has a substantially dif­ferent content (after its Second Reading) as the debated age was changed to 12 and the term “crim­inal” was changed to “social.”

Even with such changes, there are still groups that are against the proposal because they believe that children who are not more than 15 years old still cannot do criminal discernment and should not be held liable.

It appears that there were lots of misconceptions about the version of the bill approved by the Com­mittee on Justice of the House of Representatives, i.e. lowering the age of criminal responsibility to nine (from 15). Such misconceptions are still used as arguments in counter­ing the current version that was approved by the House of Repre­sentatives on Second Reading.

First, while the original term used was “age of criminal responsibil­ity,” concerned children will not be regarded as “criminals” but as “children in conflict with law.”

The difference in the term bears on how our society intends to treat (or reform) children who violate our laws.

The proposal of the Commit­tee on Justice of the House of Representatives did not in any way include the incarceration or jailing of concerned children. The proposal was for them to be automatically committed to Bahay Pagasa – institution that specifically delivers reform services to children in conflict with law – which will be set up all over the country.

Are those who opposed the said proposal opposing the move of the government to reform the concerned children?

Some groups opposed the proposal because they believe that its current state, the Bahay Pagasa units in our country are not equipped and do not have effective programs to reform the children in conflict with law.

Should we disregard the societal need that the proposal aims to respond to simply because of the weaknesses or capability concerns of Bahay Pagasa units?

Shouldn’t we instead push for a proposal that will address the wors­ening case of children in conflict with law by lowering the age of criminal responsibility AND providing for the needed capabilities of Bahay Pagasa?

Both components of the pro­posal are requisites in addressing our real problem about children in conflict with law. We should push for a law that will provide for both components and not use the current state of one component to reject the proposal altogether.

(To be continued)