Parents at the Bradford Christian School have paid into a fighting fund to defend the school's right to smack their children.

The new law outlawing corporal punishment in private schools came into effect yesterday.

But the Bradford Christian School, founded in Idle six years ago, is one of five schools nationwide briefing a lawyer to contest the smacking ban, at the European Court of Human Rights.

It is a member of the Christian Schools' Trust which is backing a legal test case, brought by the Christian Fellowship School in Liverpool. Other schools - including the one in Bradford - are forwarding supportive information to the lawyer who will present the case.

And some Bradford parents have responded to an appeal for cash to pay for the challenge.

Corporal punishment in state schools was outlawed in the 1980s and the ban has been extended to private schools by the School Standards and Framework Act.

Phillip Moon, head teacher at the Bradford Christian School, said the school would abide by the law but was hopeful that the legal challenge would succeed, so that the school's current policy on corporal punishment could continue.

At the £1,500 per year school, a 'paddle' or wooden ruler is used to discipline wilful or defiant children once other sanctions have been exhausted.

It has been used four times in the past three years and is only used by the headmaster under controlled conditions and with the agreement of parents, Mr Moon said.

The school has 135 pupils - boys and girls aged four to 16.

"Five schools, including ourselves, have been asked to submit information to the solicitor who will be fighting it at Strasbourg," Mr Moon said.

"We feel that on certain occasions, it is an effective way of getting the right kind of behaviour you are wanting from children. It's when they have been deliberately and wilfully defiant or disobedient."

The Christian schools' legal challenge has "no hope" of success, according to Peter Newell, co-ordinator of the End Physical Punishment of Children (EPOCH) campaign.

He said: "Teachers have for a long time supported abolition, and the Independent Schools' Joint Council which represents more than 80 per cent of independent schools has also supported this."

The Government has rejected the claims by head teachers of Christian schools that banning corporal punishment in state schools has led to a deterioration in pupils' behaviour.

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