A. v. THE UNITED KINGDOM JUDGMENT OF 23 SEPTEMBER 1998 6 complaint under Article 14 in conjunction with Articles 3 and 8 of the Convention. The full text of the Commission’s opinion and of the two separate opinions contained in the report is reproduced as an annex to this judgment1. FINAL SUBMISSIONS TO THE COURT 18. In their memorial and at the hearing, the Government accepted the reasoning and the conclusion of the Commission that there had been a violation of Article 3. However, they asked the Court to confine itself to considering the facts of the case without making any general statement about the corporal punishment of children. The applicant asked the Court to find violations of Articles 3 and 8 of the Convention and to confirm that national law should not condone directly or by implication any level of deliberate violence to children. AS TO THE LAW I. ALLEGED VIOLATION OF ARTICLE 3 OF THE CONVENTION 19. The applicant asked the Court to find a violation of Article 3 of the Convention, which provides: “No one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.” Both the Commission and the Government accepted that there had been a violation of Article 3. Despite this, the Court considers it necessary to examine itself the issues in this case (see, for example, the Findlay v. the United Kingdom judgment of 25 February 1997, Reports of Judgments and Decisions 1997-I, p. 263). As is its usual practice, the Court will limit examination to the specific facts of the case before it. 20. The Court recalls that ill-treatment must attain a minimum level of severity if it is to fall within the scope of Article 3. The assessment of this minimum is relative: it depends on all the circumstances of the case, such as the nature and context of the treatment, its duration, its physical and mental 1. Note by the Registrar. For practical reasons this annex will appear only with the printed version of the judgment (in Reports of Judgments and Decisions 1998), but a copy of the Commission’s report is obtainable from the registry.