A Blog For Mums
The first time my daughter asked me to knock before entering her room, I paused. Not because I didn’t want to respect her wishes — but because it raised a bigger question I’d never really considered before: do kids actually have a legal right to privacy from their parents?
As a parent, it’s natural to feel that your job is to know what’s going on in your child’s life. And in many ways, it is. We want to protect them, guide them, and help them grow into safe, happy, healthy adults. But as they get older, they start carving out their own space — emotionally and physically. And sooner or later, the question comes up: how much of that space are we legally supposed to respect?
Turns out, the answer isn’t totally straightforward — but the law does have something to say.
In the UK, children do have a right to privacy — and that right is protected under both domestic and international law.
The biggest foundation comes from the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC), which the UK has signed and committed to. Article 16 of the convention says:
“No child shall be subjected to arbitrary or unlawful interference with his or her privacy, family, home or correspondence.”
In short, children are recognised as having a right to private thoughts, private communication, and personal space.
But — and it’s a big but — this right is balanced against a parent’s legal duty to protect and care for their child.
Under the Children Act 1989, parents (or anyone with parental responsibility) are legally required to safeguard and promote their child’s welfare. This means that parents are allowed — and sometimes expected — to step in, even if it means overriding a child’s privacy in certain situations.
So, while your child has a right to privacy, that right isn’t absolute. The law gives you room to intervene if you have legitimate concerns about their wellbeing or safety.
The law also recognises that a child’s rights grow with them. A toddler doesn’t have the same level of privacy expectations as a teenager — and rightly so.
This is where the concept of Gillick competence comes in. It’s a legal principle that emerged from a famous UK case in the 1980s. In short, it means that if a child is mature enough to understand and make decisions about something, they should be allowed to do so without parental interference.
It started in the context of medical treatment but is now used more broadly. So, if your 15-year-old is mature and understands the consequences of their decisions, the law might lean more toward respecting their privacy — even from you.
In practice, this means that:
It’s not about a specific age, but about how well your child understands the situation and the risks involved.
The law also makes it clear that privacy doesn’t mean secrecy from consequences — and you’re not breaking any rules by stepping in if you believe your child’s wellbeing is at risk.
For example, you’re legally allowed to:
The key point is that it has to be proportionate and motivated by care, not control.
You can’t monitor every aspect of their life indefinitely — but you can act if you have serious concerns. And in doing so, you’re still acting within the law.
Even though the law allows you to override your child’s privacy in certain situations, that doesn’t mean you always should. In fact, the more trust you build early on, the less likely you are to need to breach their privacy at all.
From a legal perspective, respecting your child’s right to privacy as they mature shows that you’re upholding your duty to support their development into an independent adult.
And from a parenting perspective, it sets the stage for a relationship built on trust, rather than secrecy or rebellion.
Here’s what’s helped in our home:
One of the trickiest areas to navigate these days is digital privacy. When I was growing up, “private” meant a locked diary or a whispered phone call on the landline. Now it means passwords, Snapchat streaks, hidden apps, and internet histories that can disappear in seconds.
And as a parent, this can feel impossible to keep up with. We want to give our children space and trust — but the digital world moves fast, and it’s full of risks. That’s where the legal grey area becomes even trickier. While you do have a right to monitor your child’s digital activity if it’s in the name of protection, the more intrusive your approach, the more likely you are to cause damage to the trust you’re trying to build.
Rather than trying to police everything, I’ve found it more effective to work with my children to create shared rules. Things like:
These are not just practical — they’re legally sensible too. Because while you’re within your rights to access their accounts, doing so secretly or constantly, without a clear safeguarding reason, could be seen as a breach of their developing rights to autonomy.
So where does all of this leave us as parents?
The law says that children have a right to privacy — but it also says we have a duty to protect them. Those two responsibilities can feel like they’re in conflict, but in reality, they’re meant to grow together.
Privacy doesn’t mean absence. It means guidance, presence, and knowing when to step back so they can step up. And legally speaking, that’s exactly what’s expected of us: to gradually shift the balance from supervision to trust, in line with our child’s maturity.
There’s no perfect blueprint for how to do this. Some children want privacy earlier than others. Some need more oversight for longer. But what I’ve learned is that if I keep the conversations going — and make it clear that privacy is something we both value — we end up on the same side more often than not.
Yes, children in the UK do have a legal right to privacy — one that becomes stronger as they grow older and show maturity. But you, as their parent, are not powerless. The law supports you in stepping in when necessary, especially when safety is on the line.
The challenge is to do so with care. To make decisions that protect without smothering, to offer trust without abandoning responsibility, and to adapt your parenting as your child develops into the person they’re meant to become.
For me, it all comes down to this: I want my kids to know that I trust them — and that I’m here, watching their backs, not breathing down their necks. If we can build that balance, then we’re not just respecting their legal rights — we’re setting them up for life.
Children and the Law
