Children and Young Persons Ordinance to be strengthened

26 February 2012 08:36 pm

Amendments are to be introduced to strengthen the existing laws pertaining to children and the young and to enhance punishments for offenders of the law and adopt a mechanism to register all orphanages in the country on a set of standards for the purpose of regulating orphanages, a senior official of the Justice Ministry said yesterday.  

Justice Ministry Secretary, Kamalini de Silva told the Daily Mirror that the Ministry of Justice was at present working towards considering necessary amendments to the legislation relating to children with a view to introduce a new set of laws that fulfils present day demands as the existing laws are archaic and do not meet current needs. 

“In view of the recent public calls for the revision of existing laws relating to children, it was felt that it was imperative that amendments to some of these laws be considered including replacing the Children and Young Person’s Ordinance (1939) and the Orphanages Ordinance (1941),” Mrs. de Silva stressed. (Sandun A. Jayasekera)