'Forty years and that punch in the face has never gone away' - corporal punishment survivors tell of abuse they suffered in schools

Peter Kane, a survivor, shared painful memories of his school days, recalling that he attended every day feeling an 'element of fear' due to the corporal punishment inflicted by teachers. He described an experience of receiving 'clatters around the head' and 'six or 12 slaps' with a leather strap, highlighting the brutal reality of physical abuse in Irish schools.

The RTÉ documentary questions the official record-keeping habits in Irish schools, indicating only 108 allegations of physical abuse were officially recorded over a 20-year period, which raises concerns given the scale of students involved.

Despite the ban on corporal punishment introduced in 1982, the document reveals that allegations of physical violence did not cease, indicating schools remained unsafe for students for many years, with teachers immune from prosecution until 1997.

Read at Irish Independent