regulations are in place making it mandatory to report suspected incidents.

The regulations, now being drawn up, are essential if the Children's Act passed last year is to be put in place.

George Savoury, the Director of Social Work in Nova Scotia who is on the Island to help draft the rules, has rightly said that enactment will give children's issues greater prominence.

Great care has to be taken on this issue. Making reporting mandatory will ensure that genuine child abuse cases are not brushed under the carpet or dismissed without an investigation.

But there is also a risk that reporting the cases will result in great damage to the accused if the allegations prove groundless or where the report has been made for malicious reasons.

For that reason, it is important that the identities of the accused be kept confidential until the person is convicted. The identity of the alleged victim should also be secret.

The people drafting the regulations will also need to be careful about the compilation of a register of people convicted of child abuse which employers can vet when they are hiring people for jobs with children.

Access to the Register will need to be carefully considered to decide who can have access to it and how much access they should be allowed. A decision will have to be made on whether the register is completely open to the public, or if employers will have to apply to find out if a particular individual is on it.

And the framers will need to decide if people can come off the register after a period of time or after they have been through a period of rehabilitation.

While there may be good reason for people convicted of sexual abuse to remain on the list in perpetuity, a person convicted of hitting a child 20 years earlier might have a strong argument for being taken off the register.

There is probably no area more fraught with difficulties or moral dilemmas than child abuse. The damage which can be done to children is enormous, as is the damage which can be done to people who are mistakenly accused.

Care needs to be taken to get the regulations right -- the first time.