This week in the House of Commons, I spoke in support of an important and long-overdue change to the law that will strengthen protection for children and families across our country. The Victims and Courts Bill, currently progressing through Parliament, will now include a vital measure that ensures convicted paedophiles can no longer retain parental responsibility over any child, not just the child they have abused.
This is a simple but essential principle: no convicted paedophile should have control or influence over a child’s life. Protecting all children from sexual abuse is one of the most serious responsibilities we hold as Members of Parliament. It is our duty to ensure that children can live happy, safe, and healthy lives free from fear and fully protected from those who have committed the most heinous crimes.
Under the existing law, an offender could only lose parental rights if they had abused their own child. That meant that in cases where a parent was convicted of serious sexual offences against any child, they could still retain legal authority over their own son or daughter authority to make decisions about their schooling, medical care, or even permission for trips abroad. This was an unacceptable loophole, and one that caused immense distress and financial hardship.
This glaring anomaly in the law was first identified in the last Parliament, where I supported an amendment to the Crime and Justice Bill in 2024. The proposal was straightforward: anyone convicted of a serious sexual offence against a child, should automatically lose parental responsibility and that is why I campaigned hard to ensure this would become law, our children deserve all the protections we can afford them and the way the system currently works is fundamentally wrong and although this amendment did not pass, the fight continued.
I am pleased to say that finally the Government has now listened, with the Victims and Courts Bill initially limited the removal of parental rights to cases involving the offender’s own child. That would have left families like Bethan’s still unprotected. But after hard, consistent campaigning, the Bill has now been amended so that all convicted paedophiles who have committed serious sexual offences against any child will automatically have their parental rights restricted.
This is Parliament working at its best listening, learning, and acting together in the interests of vulnerable children. These new measures will make a real and immediate difference. They will ensure that parental responsibility is automatically restricted following sentencing, removing the need for families to endure lengthy and costly court battles. They will provide swift protection for children born of rape and for those whose parents are convicted of serious child sex offences.
In short, this change is about fairness, safety, and justice. It ensures that those who have committed the most serious crimes against children can no longer play any active role in a child’s life and as your Member of Parliament I feel it is my duty to ensure the law is reflective of this.
