Call to reduce the age of consent to 14

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The controversy over the legal age of consent has been re- ignited after a Scots academic called for it to be lowered to 14. Dr Matthew Waites, a lecturer in sociology at Glasgow University, said lowering the age limit from 16 to 14 for young people who are less than two years apart would recognise the fact that many teenagers regard sex as "normal behaviour". His comments were described as "madness" by a family charity, but one of Scotland's leading child-protection bodies said under-16s who engage in consensual sex should not be criminalised. Norman Wells, the director of the Family Education Trust, said: "To suggest that teenagers are at the mercy of their hormones demonstrates a failure to respect them as rational people."

source: Article 'Call to reduce the age of consent to 14' by Kevin Schofield; thescotsman.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=259572007; The Scotsman; 17 February 2007