It will no longer be possible to avoid punishment for bullying at school: responsibility may catch up even after a year

Bullying in schools may cease to be one of those offenses for which it is possible to avoid responsibility due to delays in case consideration. The Verkhovna Rada proposes to significantly increase the period during which the court can impose an administrative penalty for bullying participants in the educational process.

The authors of the bill explain the need for changes by the fact that in recent years hundreds of bullying cases were closed solely due to the expiration of the statutory terms, although the fact of the offense could have been confirmed.

The Verkhovna Rada Committee on Law Enforcement recommended that parliament adopt as a basis bill No. 14127 on amendments to Article 38 of the Code of Ukraine on Administrative Offenses regarding the extension of the terms for imposing administrative penalties for bullying (harassment) of participants in the educational process.

What changes does the bill propose

The bill provides for increasing the period for imposing an administrative penalty for offenses under Article 173-4 of the Code of Ukraine on Administrative Offenses from three months to one year from the date of the offense. To do this, it proposes amendments to part six of Article 38 of the Code of Ukraine on Administrative Offenses.

The authors of the document note that the current three-month period often does not allow holding the guilty accountable. According to the explanatory note, from 2019 to 2024, 221 bullying cases were closed due to the expiration of the terms for bringing to administrative responsibility. The share of such decisions ranged from 10% to 32% of the total number of cases considered.

According to the initiators, increasing the term to one year will complicate the possibility of avoiding responsibility and will contribute to a more effective response to cases of bullying in the educational environment.

The Main Scientific and Expert Department of the Apparatus of the Verkhovna Rada supported the bill, while drawing attention to a technical typo in its text.

The Ministry of Internal Affairs, Ministry of Finance, and Ministry of Education and Science also expressed no objections to the document. The Ministry of Youth and Sports, as well as the Ministry of Justice, supported the proposed changes.

What the educational ombudsman proposes

Educational Ombudsman Nadiya Leshchyk supported the legislative initiative but emphasized that it does not solve a number of systemic problems. Among them are the absence in the Code of Administrative Offenses of responsibility for violence and cruel treatment of a child, different interpretations of the concept of bullying, inconsistency of norms regarding the protection of children and educators, insufficient fines, as well as the lack of proper protection for adult learners.

In particular, the ombudsman proposed establishing responsibility for violence against children, unifying the definition of bullying, increasing fines to 300–600 non-taxable minimum incomes of citizens, and providing additional protection guarantees for adult students and teaching staff.

Why the discussion about the terms of bringing to responsibility arose

At the same time, specialists from the Research Institute of State Building and Local Self-Government of the National Academy of Legal Sciences of Ukraine expressed the opinion that the period for imposing an administrative penalty should be increased not to one year, but to six months. They justified this position by analogy with offenses provided for in Articles 173-2 and 173-6 of the Code of Ukraine on Administrative Offenses, which concern domestic violence and gender-based violence.

As previously reported by the "Judicial and Legal Newspaper", bill No. 14127 is aimed at eliminating situations where persons involved in bullying in educational institutions avoid responsibility due to the expiration of the three-month period for bringing to administrative responsibility. The authors of the document name this problem as one of the main reasons for the need for legislative changes.

Currently, the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Law Enforcement has recommended that parliament support the bill in the first reading and adopt it as a basis.

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