[8 Edw. 7.]

Children Act, 1908.

[Ch. 67 .]

maintain, a child, requiring him to cleanse the person andclothing of the child, the authority shall also furnish him withwritten instructions describing the manner in which the cleansingmay best be effected.

(6) The examination and cleansing of girls under this sectionshall only be effected by a duly qualified medical practitioner orby a woman duly authorised as herein-before provided.

(7) For the purposes of this section “medical officer” meansany officer appointed for the purpose of section thirteen of theEducation (Administrative Provisions) Act, 1907.

General.

. 123 .-— (1) Where a person, whether charged with an offenceor not, is brought before any court otherwise than for thepurpose of giving evidence, and it appears to the court that heis a child or young person, the court shall make due inquiiyas to the age of that person, and for that purpose shall takesuch evidence as may be forthcoming at the hearing of the case,but an order or judgment of the court shall not be invalidatedby any subsequent proof that the age of that person has notbeen correctly stated to the court, and the age presumed ordeclared by the court to be the age of the person so broughtbefore it shall, for the purposes of this Act, be deemed to be thetrue age of that person, and, where it appears to the court thatthe person so brought before it is of the age of sixteen years orupwards, that person shall for the purposes of this Act be deemednot to be a child or young person.

(2) Where in a charge or indictment for an offence underthis Act, or any of the offences mentioned in the First Scheduleto this Act, except an offence under the Criminal Law Amend-ment Act, 1885, it is alleged that the person by or in respect ofwhom the offence was committed was a child or young person orwas under or above any specified age, and he appears to thecourt to have been at the date of the commission of the allegedoffence a child or young person, or to have been under or abovethe specified age, as the case may be, he shall for thfe purposesof this Act be presumed at that date to have been a child oryoung person or to have been under or above that age, as thecase may be, unless the contrary is proved.

(3) Where in any charge or indictment for an offence underthis Act or any of the offences mentioned in the First Scheduleto this Act it is alleged that the person in respect of whom theoffence was committed was a child or was a young person, itshall not be a defence to prove that the person alleged to havebeen a child was a young person or the person alleged to havebeen a young person was a child in any case where the acts con-stituting the alleged offence would equally have been an offenceif committed in respect of a young person or child respectively.

(4) Where a person is charged with an offence under thisAct in respect of a person apparently under a specified age it

E 65

A.D. 1906.

7 Edw. 7.0. 43.

Presumptionand determina-tion of age.