TODAY show host says, "the strap helped me get through school".

The “should kids get the strap” debate is back.

And it Just. Got. Interesting.

Ben Fordham revealed this morning, live on the TODAY Show, that he is somewhat pro-strap. Fordham was responding to comments by Co-Chair of the National Curriculum Review, Kevin Donnelly, that Australian schools should bring back corporal punishment.

“The strap helped me get through school,” Fordham said.

Naturally, we needed to know more, so we called Fordham for a bit more detail.

“I was a trouble maker as a kid and one of the few things I was afraid of was the strap,” he told Mamamia.

“At school we’d be whacked on the hands with a leather strap if we landed in strife. If we were in deep trouble, we’d get 6 whacks across the hands. It bloody hurt physically, but it didn’t hurt me mentally. It taught me boundaries and consequences.”

Sure, use of a long black leather strap on the back of the leg or hand, was quite common a few decades ago. It was only in the 1980s that attitudes to corporal punishment began to change. And currently, the pendulum’s swung so far that even the thought of sending a child to the naughty corner is viewed by some as a ‘human rights abuse’.

In that context, the thought of a teacher these days legally laying a hand on a child seems totally absurd.

Studies such as the Australian Institute of Family Studies research paper have found that corporal punishment can often result in anti-social behaviour and poor academic outcomes for students. Without many other options available to them, teachers have been just been giving out detention as punishment.

That wouldn’t have worked on Fordham, he tells us: “I wasn’t afraid of detention. I wasn’t afraid of suspension. I was afraid of the strap.

“I’m not pretending it works for everyone, but for some reason it worked on me.  There were hundreds of moments I decided to think again before doing something stupid, because I feared the strap.”

The Today Show/ 2GB radio host rejects the idea that getting the strap might turn you into an aggressive adult. “It hasn’t turned me into a violent person.  I’ve never started a fight in my life.  On the odd occasion someone wanted to fight me, I said no thanks and walked away.

“But just because it worked on me, doesn’t mean I want someone whacking my child with a leather strap.  I don’t have children of my own yet but I can’t imagine I’d be comfortable having them come home with red hands after being whacked by someone I don’t know with a chunk of leather. ”

Yes, he knows that’s contradictory:  “That might be a bit contradictory, but that’s life,” he said.

It’s a fiery topic, but also a dilemma a lot of parents and educators face.

On the one hand, no one wants a disruptive classroom environment. But does that mean returning to the days where corporal punishment was commonplace is the way to achieve it?

Did you ever get the strap at school? Do you think it should come back?