Each small long holiday is the peak tourist season, due to the huge flow of people, some scenic spots in Zhejiang, Jiangsu, Henan, Shanghai and other places can only take measures to restrict the flow. Among so many tourists, there are some parents who take their children on a family trip. As a result, the preferential standards for children's tickets in scenic spots have once again aroused controversy.
"Our child was less than 4 years old and 1.03 meters tall, so he let us buy a half-price student ticket." Ms. Liang, who plays with children in Beijing Wild Animal Park, told the "Legal Person" reporter that she is difficult to accept the child ticket standard for the scenic spot regardless of age but only the height. Should the preferential standards for scenic child tickets be determined by height or by age? Liu Junhai, a law professor at Chinese Min University, believes that with the improvement of living standards, children's height is also changing, and scenic spots should use age rather than height as a preferential standard for children's tickets.
Beijing Zoo Panda Pavilion fees
"Height is the only criterion" is difficult to accept
On May 1, at the entrance of the Beijing Wildlife Park, several mothers gathered to discuss the charging of children's tickets. Among them, Ms. Liang told the "Legal Person" reporter: "Our child is only 3 and a half years old, 1.03 meters tall, let us buy a half-price student ticket, regardless of age only look at the height, I can't accept it." Through the conversation with Ms. Liang, the reporter learned that the free standard of child tickets in Beijing Wildlife Park is less than 1 meter, while children above 1 meter and full-time undergraduate students must purchase half-price student tickets.
The reporter noticed at the scene that most of the families who came to beijing wildlife park to play brought children. The reporter also randomly interviewed parents of different ages, who were suspicious of the park's charging standards for children. Mr. Pan told reporters that his children are 4 years old this year, and they often take their children to the Beijing Zoo in Xizhimen, Beijing, "The free standard for children in beijing zoo is the double requirement of age and height, as long as the age of 6 is free, the current children are taller than the previous children, and the 1 meter standard formulated by the Beijing Wildlife Park is not reasonable." ”
In addition to the Beijing Wild Animal Park, which only uses height as the standard for children's tickets, parks such as Chimelong Wildlife World, Zhuhai Hengqin Chimelong Ocean Kingdom and Tianjin Haichang Polar Ocean Park are only based on height as the standard for children's tickets, and the free standard is that children's height must not exceed 1 meter.
However, the latest 2021 edition of the National Health Commission's "Reference Standards for the Growth and Development of Children Under 7 Years of Age in China" shows that the median height of Chinese boys can exceed 1 meter at 42 months (3 and a half years old). At 45 months, the median standard height of a Chinese girl also exceeded 1 meter.
Previously, data from the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention showed that from 1992 to 2002, the average height of 6-year-old urban male children across the country increased by 4.9 centimeters, and by 2012, it increased by 3.7 centimeters to 1.2 meters, the average height of 12-year-old children has exceeded 1.5 meters, and the average height of 14-year-old children has reached or approached about 1.6 meters. In addition, according to the 2020 "Report on the Nutrition and Chronic Disease Status of Chinese Residents", in the past five years, the average height of boys and girls aged 6 to 17 in each age group has increased by 1.6 cm and 1 cm respectively.
The director of a kindergarten in Beijing told reporters, "In recent years, the height of children in nursery has been increasing, compared with 5 years ago, there have been great changes. There is indeed a problem if the old standards are also used to determine the height of children. ”
expert:
Child ticket standards shall be subject to legal regulations
According to a previous survey by the relevant media, among the nearly 2,000 parents interviewed, 67.1% of the parents of the children surveyed agreed that the child ticket charging should be based on age.
"As early as 2012, the National Development and Reform Commission clearly stipulated in the Notice on Further Implementing preferential policies for youth ticket prices: 'The tourist visiting spots that implement government pricing and government guidance price management in various places, and the youth ticket price policy standards, free tickets for children under 6 years old (inclusive) or under 1.2 meters (inclusive) in height; half tickets for minors aged 6 (exclusive) to 18 years old (inclusive)."" Wang Lijuan, head of a travel agency in Beijing, told reporters that in recent years, the main problem involving children's tourism is the problem of scenic spot charges, and many parents have great doubts about the charging standards. "They always think that children should be free, but in fact, many scenic spots do not give children corresponding discounts."
Liu Junhai, a professor at the Law School of Chinese Min University, said in an interview with reporters: "Since it is a preferential treatment for children, it must be based on age, and height should not be used as a standard. He said that if the height of children is used as the preferential standard for children's tickets in scenic spots, there will be problems of carving boats and seeking swords and metaphysics.
Liu Junhai told reporters that the minors mentioned in China's Law on the Protection of Minors refer to citizens under the age of 18, which stipulates that patriotic education bases, libraries, youth palaces, and children's activity centers should be open to minors free of charge; museums, memorial halls, science and technology museums, exhibition halls, art galleries, cultural centers, stadiums, zoos, parks, and other places should be opened to minors free of charge or preferentially in accordance with relevant regulations; the Tourism Law stipulates that minors should be open to minors free of charge or preferentially in accordance with the law in tourism activities. Laws and regulations and relevant provisions enjoy convenience and preferential treatment. According to this, the preferential standard of scenic child tickets should only be age, not height.
In addition, Dong Wenyong, an associate researcher at the Institute of Law of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, also expressed a similar view in an interview with a media, saying that "child" is an "age" concept and has nothing to do with the concept of "height". Our laws clearly define the principle of equal rights. According to some current regulations, some of them can enjoy the preferential treatment of child tickets, while the other part is treated as adults; some of the young children enjoy free ticket treatment, while the other part is treated with half of the vote; this objectively causes unequal treatment of children and even children of the same age. ”
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The question of child ticket discount standards has a long history
In fact, Shanghai Disneyland was once sued in court for the "height-only theory" of children's tickets.
At the beginning of 2018, when Liu Minde took his 10-year-old daughter to Shanghai Disneyland, he was asked to buy a standard ticket because of her daughter's height problem. Liu Minde believes that setting fares based on height is neither reasonable nor unfair, and children's tickets should be defined by age. The park side believes that the actual age is not easy to be quickly and intuitively identified, and if it is verified by birth certificate or student ID card, it may cause security risks due to the large passenger flow in the park.
Afterwards, Liu Minde took Shanghai Disneyland to court. During the lawsuit, Liu Minde pointed out that Disneyland, as an amusement agency that purchases tickets according to the global age standard, has violated its industry practice by adopting a height standard Chinese mainland, and stressed that this unreasonable child ticket standard is obviously an unequal treatment of Chinese mainland children. Take Tokyo Disneyland as an example: children under 4 years old (not included) are free of charge, children between 4 and 11 years old purchase child tickets, students 12 to 17 years old purchase student tickets, and 18 years old and older need to purchase adult tickets.
Finally, Shanghai Disneyland changed the standard for child tickets in 2019: from October 8, 2019, child guests aged 3 (inclusive) to 11 years old (inclusive) or taller than 1.0 meters to 1.4 meters (including 1.4 meters) on the day of the park visit can enjoy a discount of about 25% off the Shanghai Disneyland ticket price. Infants and young children under the age of 3 or 1.0 meters or below on the day of the park visit can enter the park free of charge.
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Author: Li Yunshi, all-media reporter of "Legal Person"
Source: Legal Network
Source: Legal Network