UNDER the law, it is illegal for those under 16 to have sex.

But should we go hard on this young couple and throw the law book at them?

Or should we adopt a softer approach by trying to understand and counsel them?

Youth counsellors say it appears that teenagers are being initiated into sex earlier. A jump in the number of statutory rape cases - from nine in 2003 to 63 last year - hints at this, a Straits Times report said. The police figures in February this year showed that 310 girls below the age of 16 were caught engaging in underage consensual sex last year - nearly 45 per cent more than the year before.

Five years ago, the number was 163.

Technician Raymond Heng, 36, said: 'I would flip if it's my daughter who's having sex at that age. They're just kids and they're too immature to deal with the consequences.

'As parents, we need to guide our children but the law needs to protect them too.'

He has a daughter aged 6.

Human resource manager Rosalind Lee, 42, said: 'These kids may be at that age when hormones are raging but it's not right to have sex at such a young age. They're still young, what if the girl gets pregnant? She's still a child.'

She has two kids, son 12, daughter, 10.

Mr David Kan, president and co-founder of the Family Life Centre, said: 'This is an exploratory stage in their life and while it's not wrong taking legal action, how will it help the young couple?

'The parents have to stop blaming the kids, step in to guide them on this exploratory phase and teach them about the boundaries, responsibilities and re-construct their value systems.'

Junior college student Justin Lee, 18, said: 'I think that pre-marital sex early is part and parcel of teenage life, it's nothing to be frowned upon in this age.

'As long as both of them are responsible, I don't see anything wrong with it. I know some of my friends have done it - their parents don't know, of course.'

Polytechnic student Daphne Wee, 17, said: 'I don't agree with pre-marital sex but when you're young, you do foolish things sometimes without thinking about the consequences.

'And having sex is one of them.'

Youth counsellors are also seeing more cases of young teens at 'sexual or moral risk': Of 721 children screened by counsellors after their parents had sought beyond parental control orders last year, nearly a quarter, or 171, were found to have already experienced sex in one form or another.