Tony Hudgell’s Campaign Secures Child Cruelty Register as Bill Amendment Moves Forward
Eleven-year-old Tony Hudgell and his adoptive mother Paula have won a long-running campaign that will see a Child Cruelty Register established through an amendment to the Crime and Policing Bill. The move matters now because ministers expect to table the amendment shortly, and it would impose monitoring and reporting obligations on parents and caregivers convicted of serious child harm.
Tony Hudgell campaign and family background
Tony Hudgell, who had both legs amputated after he was assaulted as a baby by his birth parents, has been at the centre of the push for a register. He received the British Empire Medal for services to the prevention of child abuse and co-founded the Tony Hudgell Foundation, which helped raise more than £1. 7m for charity during the pandemic. Paula Hudgell, from West Malling in Kent, has led the public campaign and said the register is a vital step to ensure adults who harm or neglect children cannot simply move on unnoticed.
Details of the attack by Jody Simpson and Anthony Smith
Tony was 41 days old when Jody Simpson and her partner Anthony Smith attacked him. The assault caused multiple fractures and dislocations and blunt trauma to the face, which led to organ failure, toxic shock and sepsis. He was left untreated and in agony for 10 days; because of the extent of his injuries both legs had to be amputated. Simpson and Smith were jailed for 10 years in 2018 for inflicting the injuries that led to the amputations.
Proposed register measures and scope
The Child Cruelty Register would cover child neglect, child cruelty, abandonment, female genital mutilation (FGM) and infanticide. Those placed on the register would face requirements similar to registered sex offenders: they would have to notify police if they move house, change their identity, travel abroad or live with children again after serving their sentence. Proposals put forward also include obligations to declare name changes, new relationships, and certain notification if staying in a home for 12 hours or more with children; some offenders could be required to inform police of planned private contact with youngsters.
Government action: Crime and Policing Bill amendment
The register is to be established through an amendment to the Crime and Policing Bill, which ministers expect to table shortly. The Government had indicated in November that it could introduce a register following the Hudgell family campaign, and Conservative MPs have vowed to table the amendment as the Bill moves through the House of Lords. Officials say the register is intended to make those who have served sentences for child cruelty visible to the police so authorities can act when risks arise.
Political responses and officials named
Sentencing minister Jake Richards paid tribute to Paula Hudgell for her campaign, describing her efforts as a remarkable fight to prevent other children suffering similar abuse. Safeguarding minister Jess Phillips said it is unforgivable that someone who should care for a child would hurt them and stressed that ministers had listened to the Hudgells. Shadow Justice Secretary Nick Timothy described the proposed amendment as a vital safeguard to prevent people convicted of brutal child cruelty from disappearing from view. Paula Hudgell has thanked supporters including Helen Grant MP; in another account Helen Grant is named as Shadow Solicitor General, an inconsistency that is unclear in the provided context.
Scale, impact estimates and broader context
Conservative campaigners have argued there is currently no central system to track offenders who have served time for physical or emotional cruelty towards children, and cited prevalence figures that say 16. 5% of adults in England and Wales experienced physical abuse as children, 22. 7% experienced emotional abuse, and 29% experienced some form of abuse. A Home Office official told Shadow Solicitor General Helen Grant that some 900 to 1, 000 offenders could be added to the register each year; policy chiefs have flagged concerns about overwhelming police resources if caseloads grow too large. What makes this notable is that the measure ties a discrete legislative change to a visible set of reporting duties, shifting responsibility from ad hoc post-release supervision to a formal register intended to give safeguarding teams tools and visibility to prevent further abuse.
Campaigning by Paula Hudgell has been described in different accounts as spanning seven years in one version and eight years in another, and that discrepancy is unclear in the provided context. Regardless, the family point to prior progress including the introduction of Tony's Law, which strengthened sentencing for those who cause or allow serious harm to children, and say the new register builds on that work.
Officials and ministers frame the register as a way to close loopholes that currently allow convicted child abusers to change names, move to new areas, or form new relationships without mandatory notification to authorities. Policy makers will need to balance the register's intended protective effects against practical enforcement limits as the Bill proceeds through Parliament.
