In an interview with the Daily Telegraph, Paul Mendelle QC said the current age of criminal responsibility should be raised from 10 to 14.
"We have almost the lowest age of criminal responsibility in Europe and I suspect one of the lowest in the world," he said. "Ten is awfully young. A child of 10 can know he or she is doing something wrong and not always appreciate it is criminally wrong."
Mendelle called for a return to the previous system, where children aged 10 to 14 were not criminally responsible unless the prosecution could demonstrate they knew their actions were criminally wrong.
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