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A former Canberra childcare worker who smacked two children in her care has been convicted.

Una Masters, 61, is one of four people charged after an audit at the Civic Early Childcare Centre in February last year, reports ABC News.

She pleaded guilty to four unreasonable discipline charges and was convicted and fined $400.

The ACT Magistrates Court heard that on the first occasion Masters had smacked a child on the bottom so loudly another staff member heard it.

She also hit a boy on the back of the head, with enough force that he fell over, and on another occasion she hit a girl 10 times on the bottom when she would not stay awake.

Prosecutor Jane Campbell said it was a serious example which involved smacking young children and it was a breach of trust.

Magistrate Peter Dingwell agreed and convicted Masters, imposing a $400 fine.

He told the court she had already been punished by the public exposure.

Two other former workers at the centre, Rajani Gautum, 50, and Jasmina Lemesh, 62, have pleaded not guilty.

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  • I would be horrified if a Childcare worker smacked my kids, no matter how naughty they were alleged to be. These people are trained and paid to look after our kids, smacking is not in the Childcare hand books!


    • A very good point – totally unacceptable on every level.

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  • How terrible. I’m glad she was caught

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  • Justice is served & I’m glad she feels humiliated

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  • Glad this was dealt with before other kids were affected.

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  • Quite disturbing! Glad they were caught and reprimanded!!

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  • Imagine how many children would develop long term low self esteem if this behaviour continued. There is other means of punishing a child for misbehaving.

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  • I’m so glad these people were caught and stopped before they hurt any more children.

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  • A well deserved penalty – I think the fact it wasn’t isolated really made it worse.

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  • this is atrocious…i cannot believe she could do such a thing to children in her care. As a parent you put your child in care and trust that they will be looked after…this is horrible.

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  • I would become so mad if someone hit my daughter!

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  • This is just awful! I would be furious if that ever happened to my child in childcare. So glad she was found guilty.

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  • Appalling, another story about adults abusing their positions of trust.

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  • This is shocking. Hitting children whilst in your care is the biggest form of breach of trust.

    Reply

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