The Children are Our Future

Kia ora koutou,

First of all, I would like to thank MAP — the Movement for Alternatives to Prison — for giving me this opportunity to speak tonight about the debate around repeal of section 59 of the Crimes Act and the related issue of families and violence.

I hope Allan Nixon would have approved our topic for tonight, and I would like to just briefly acknowledge his work as a legal defender of low or no income people in our city at a time when there was no legal aid, no community law centres or any of the other infrastructure we have now, inadequate though it still might be.

Since July last year when my Bill to repeal section 59 was drawn from the Parliamentary ballot, I have found myself very much on the front line of many public meetings, hearings and debates on the topic, as one would expect. However, these occasions don't normally allow me, or anyone else, much — or any - time for deeper thought or reflection about what's really going on here, and I'm grateful to MAP for giving me that opportunity.

I am also aware that there may be some people in our community who would question the relevance of the repeal of section 59 to a group whose primary focus is on our justice and prison systems. However, I don't think there are too many of you here in this room who would doubt the relationship between what happens to babies and children as they are growing up, and what the outcomes are when they reach maturity.

We have had more than enough evidence before the Select Committee over the last few months to show the direct relationship between the levels of violence inside the home and adverse consequences later on in terms of mental illness, addictions, and rates of criminal offending. I know it is a truism, but violence does breed violence, while nurturing and love breed security and maturity. This struggle for repeal that so many of us are engaged in at the moment is indeed a contest for the very lives and futures of our children.

What I have found really striking over the past year in the public discourse around section 59, is that it operates across an unusually broad range of dimensions and plunges us deeply into some of the worst (and best) aspects of New Zealand's psyche and culture. The level of abuse directed against me and other proponents of repeal has at times been vitriolic, and even downright threatening, ranging from threats of defamation and veiled hints of violence, through to the extraordinary Garnet Milne of Reformation Testimony, who widely disseminates material which says, for example, that those of us who promote repeal are under the control of the devil and are seeds of Satan. When my own children saw this, their first question was "what does this make them?"

While it's easy to laugh off some of this, underneath there are underpinnings of something quite grim in our national psyche. The dispute over whether we should continue to allow parents to legally beat and hit their children operates at psychological, religious and political levels, and has needed to be tackled in quite a complex way on all these fronts.

I'll reflect now on each of these three dimensions, before going on to talk a little about the connection between the repeal of section 59 and broader issues of family violence raised, for example, by the murder of the Kahui twins.

Section 59 debate — psychological

Turning first to the psychological aspects of the section 59 debate, what has struck me over and over again since my first engagement with it has been how deep this question is rooted in our psyches.

It touches on how we were brought up ourselves, and on how we bring up our own children.

I have lost count of how many times I've heard the phrase 'it never did me any harm' — whether it was a light smack or a literal horse whipping, so many of the victims of this violence seem determined to perpetuate it on future generations.

I think this reflects not only the fact that they've been socialised into an acceptance of violence, but also that they may feel they somehow betray their parents if they change their mind now and say violence against children isn't acceptable. Alongside this, there are the current parents who at meeting after meeting say in public, or come up to me afterwards, often quite shyly, to explain in all earnestness why it is essential that they retain the privilege of legally using physical discipline against their children.

It is clear that they see our attempt to repeal section 59 as an attack not only on their rights as parents, but also on their abilities to look after their own kids properly. I think they also often feel guilty, or are afraid of being made to feel guilty, by this attempt to change the law.

Guilt is a huge motivator, making people very resistant to change, and this is why I have constantly tried to be very careful to explain that my Bill is not aimed at attacking or oppressing all those ordinary people who are just doing the best they can to be good parents by their own lights, but is simply aimed at giving babies and children the same protection against acts of violence that adults have.

I am rather sick of the supermarket experience — it seems to be the ultimate horror story for parents. 'But what am I supposed to do when my child throws a fit in the supermarket?' has to be the most asked question on the topic of child rearing practices around this little nation of ours.

I refer such questioners to the excellent booklet put out through the SKIP programme, which explains a number of strategies for dealing with the supermarket crisis, and through the work of SKIP, Plunket and many other wonderful organisations, I hope parents are beginning to find that there are alternatives when dealing with the dreaded toddler in the supermarket experience.

And on another positive note I'd also like to mention the amazing initiative at Ngongotaha, where a whole community, predominantly tangata whenua and low income, has come together to work to make the homes in their district a violence-free zone. Representatives made a wonderful submission to the Select Committee, and it was touching to hear of the progress that has been made by many ordinary people there who simply decided enough was enough and their children deserved better.

Before I leave the psychological aspect of this debate, there is one other matter that I think underpins some of what is going on here. It has been hard to talk about in Select Committee, and in public, because of its very nature, although a few submitters have raised it.

This is the question of the connection between sexual perversion and the beating of children and young people. Very few of us want to acknowledge it up front, but in fact the more I've been immersed in this issue, and the more I've heard groups predominantly made up of men proclaiming and lauding the right of adults to beat children, and in some cases talking or writing about the right methods of administering the rod and so on, the closer the unspoken connection gets.

This is accentuated by literature put out by groups like Carey College and Tyndale Park Christian Schools in Auckland, and by Family Integrity's little booklet on corporal correction, which I'll talk about a bit more shortly.

Personally, I have no problem with sadomasochism carried out between consenting adults using safe sex practices — what I do have a problem with is a legacy of hidden sexual violence practised on children and young people under a mantle of so-called discipline.

I have also heard comments and stories from victims who have directly experienced the connection, but whose words will never be heard in public because of the nature of the offence against them. Section 59 of the Crimes Act, has been protecting the perpetrators of a vicious mix of sexual and physical abuse for generations, and I don't want this forgotten. I just want it stopped.

Section 59 debate — religious and moral

The second dimension of the debate around section 59 which I'd like to talk about tonight is the religious and moral one.

There is no getting away from the fact that a huge part of the opposition to my bill has come from people who truly believe that bringing their children up with violence is not only their right but also their literally God-given duty.

The list of groups who earlier this year formed a coalition to stop my Bill being passed includes Family Integrity, the Family First Lobby, the Sensible Sentencing Trust, the Society for the Promotion of Community Standards, the NZ Centre for Political Debate, and PANIC.

Just in case you haven't heard of the latter two organisations, as I hadn't, PANIC stands for Parents Against Negative Intervention by CYFS, and to quote from their website is 'a Christian organisation dedicated to support families who have suffered unfortunate intervention by the CYFS or other social service agencies'. The NZ Centre for Political Debate seems to be a fairly new organisation whose founding director is ACT ex-MP Muriel Newman.

These organisations have mounted an incredibly effective campaign over the past year, aimed at convincing the public, the media and my fellow MPs that repealing section 59 is a brazen attack on parents' rights, that it will mean ordinary parents in their thousands will be prosecuted for lightly smacking their children or putting them into their room for time out, and that if children aren't physically disciplined they will end up bringing our criminal justice system to its knees as adults.

It has been unfortunate that the media has bought so strongly into these groups' contention that my Bill is an 'anti-smacking' Bill, and I think that this, in itself, has been their most significant achievement. The fact that even a the Listener described my Bill in this way on its front cover a couple of weeks ago, is symptomatic of how effective their winning of the semantic war has been.

However, what underpins the ideology of these groups is a lot more serious than it may first appear. I don't know how many of you have seen a copy of the booklet issued by Craig Smith's Family Integrity organisation, 'The Christian Foundations of the Institution of Corporal Correction'. This little beauty contains such statements as:

'To further demonstrate your loving commitment to your child's upbringing, there are some practical tips. Smacking with infants and toddlers is different than smacking with children who are old enough to speak….with infants and toddlers a wee smack to the forearm or leg or just a flick to the hand …is effective…

With older children (from perhaps 18 months or two years onwards) …smacking may be a 10-15 minute process. Go to a private place, collect the smacking rod, then fully discuss the crime….' And goes on to explain how to carry this out in some detail.

As for the theology of this, the booklet says 'Evil is not picked up from the environment, as behaviourists such as B.F. Skinner would advise: it is already in their hearts from conception. Children are not little bundles of innocence: they are little bundles of depravity (see Psalm 51:5) and can develop into unrestrained agents of evil unless trained and disciplined…'

There is a lot more — feel free to read the booklet yourself, if you can bear it.

This world view is based on one strand or collection of strands of Biblical thought which stand in direct contradiction to another bunch of beliefs held by people who have just as much right to call themselves Christians.

Many people from other parts of the Christian churches came to the Select Committee to tell us that their, for example, Anglican or Quaker or Catholic theology does not support the physical punishment of children, and that, for example, 'The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love' (Psalm 103.8). Many of these Christians also go on to say that the message of Jesus and the New Testament is not one of brutalising small children, but is instead focused on how to have deeper respect and more loving relationships between humans, including between parents and children.

As someone who is not part of any Christian church, I am well aware that I am not qualified to engage in the battle of competing Biblical texts. However, throughout the debate on section 59, I have had to grapple with theological issues as they are to such a huge extent the underpinning and source of so many peoples' beliefs in this area.

I think that the concept of parents' right and duty to bring up their children with violence was a belief system brought to Aotearoa by our Pakeha missionary and settler ancestors, and is part of the legacy of European colonialism with which we are still wrestling.

None of us, Christian or heathen, tau iwi or tangata whenua, are obliged to accept this legacy. I have to say that one of the high points of the Select Committee process occurred when the seven Northern iwi made a combined submission here in Auckland in total support of full repeal, because they knew and understood the connections and the impact of violence on the families in their communities every day of the year.

The representatives of these iwi were unafraid to say that the use of violence against children is not some sacred tikanga, but rather a social construct, which can and should be thrown off along with many other negative legacies of colonisation.

Section 59 debate - political

A third major strand of this debate is of course the political one.

I wish I were talking to you here tonight from a position of having achieved full repeal of section 59 of the Crimes Act in the House of Representatives, but we're not quite there yet, and indeed we're just entering the critical final period of the Bill's progress right now.

The timeline looks like this: we are likely to finish the Select Committee process next week. The Bill will then go back to the House, and will probably have its crucial second reading in late October, just a few weeks away. If it survives the vote on the Second Reading, it will then go through the Committee stages, which is likely to mean a lengthy debate over several Private Members' days.

If the Bill is still alive after that process, it will have its final Third Reading either just before Parliament rises for Christmas, or early in the New Year.

Every MP's vote will count, and at this stage it is my perception that it is going to be a very close run thing.

The debate is spinning out along the kind of party lines one might expect. Most Labour MPs I think support full repeal, most National ones don't. It is up to each of those parties to decide whether their MPs will be whipped (an unfortunate word in this context) or will be allowed a conscience vote.

The Greens and the Maori Party, with our ten combined votes, are the only two parties to come out clearly and totally in favour of full repeal. United Future has two what I would call 'out' conservative Christian MPs who are almost certain to vote against repeal, and a Leader, Peter Dunne, who appears to have mixed feelings on the subject.

NZ First are varied, with at least one of their MPs, Brian Donnelly having a long term commitment to repeal, but others equally entrenched on the other side of the debate. I really don't know how the two ACT MPs will end up casting their vote, although, given Muriel Newman's role in the anti repeal coalition, one might well speculate.

My hope has always been that at least some of the MPs who are traditionally on the right and/or on the morally conservative side of the House might be persuaded to support repeal by the many good arguments we have on our side of the debate about the welfare of children.

After all, even the most conservative of our politicians talk constantly about the dignity and worth of families. Every MP wrings their hands when another baby, or babies, are killed by those supposed to be looking after them. And everyone is quick to talk about our children as the sacred hope of our future.

However, all MPs in the House have come under incredibly intense pressure over the last year from the opponents of repeal, and their campaign is heating up again even as I speak.

The argument that innocent parents are going to be arrested and prosecuted for lightly smacking their children if my Bill goes through is probably the most telling one in the political arena. MPs' email systems, in-trays, and electorate offices have been besieged by people convinced that this is what's going to happen.

Even MPs like some of the National ones whose hearts and minds are really in the right place on this, understandably find it hard to stand up to this kind of mass pressure from voters in their electorates.

I have tried throughout the debate to impress on MPs and the public that it is not the aim of my Bill to have thousands of ordinary parents prosecuted for the odd light smack, and that in fact this is a conservative Bill, simply carrying out what Sweden did in 1957 - remove a defence of reasonable force which allows adults to use levels of violence against children which are prohibited from use against other adults or even animals.

If I had been seeking to outlaw smacking, I would have written quite a different Bill, stating that outright, and delineating associated penalties.

However, there is no question that the political debate has been successfully impacted by the fears around criminalisation. Some of us have been looking to see if there was any way we could incorporate into the Bill amendments that would lessen these fears, and I know there is a yearning from the National benches, and from Peter Dunne, that a successful compromise be found.

However, what we cannot afford to do is in any way change the Bill so that acceptable 'reasonable force' is defined, which seems, sadly, to be the bottom line for some of these MPs.

Well meaning as they are, they do not seem to understand that defining reasonable force simply calibrates the degree and nature of acceptable violence which adults could use against children, and that we would end up with a law even worse than the one we have now in terms of its potential impact.

It is impossible to create a definition that would protect children, given that gross harm, and even death, can be caused without leaving a mark on the human body. Health professionals, including paediatricians working with abused and beaten children every day, say there is no safe level of violence, and to attempt to define one would only further legitimise its use.

Paediatricians, along with others, have also very strongly made the point that most parents and step-parents who commit acts of gross violence against babies and children, do so out of theoretical goodwill, and in the belief that they are carrying out discipline sanctioned by society. One of the most well known cases in this regard is that of James Whakaruru, the little boy who was killed in the name of toilet training.

The result of all this is that it is simply not possible, from my perspective, and that of all the groups who support repeal, to amend the Bill with any kind of definition of reasonable or acceptable force.

What that leaves us with then, are attempts to find ways to reassure parents that they will not be prosecuted en masse for the odd light smack, for putting their children in a room for time out, for physically removing their child from danger, or for stopping them from inflicting violence on people or property.

It is my hope that, through minor amendments, and through the official commentary to the Bill, that we will be able to provide this reassurance. All along, it has been clear to most of us that there is no way that, should my Bill become law, the Police would prosecute or the courts convict parents who physically restrain their children from touching a power point or crossing the road, or who put their child into their bedroom for a spell of time out. This is an absurd and patent nonsense that is being spread around the country as cover for some of the darker messages I've alluded to earlier.

On the question of light and occasional smacking itself, what I continue to try to stress to concerned parents and MPs is that police prosecution guidelines already contain a number of protections. For example, prosecution must be in the public interest, the facts of the case must be examined, and discretion can be used if an offence is trivial or minor, and of course many complaints do not result in prosecution.

Police should investigate complaints about adults assaulting children — what they do, having investigated the facts of the matter, is up to a combination of the reality and context of the situation, prosecution guidelines, and the relevant legislation. I would hope that even the most conservative politician would accept that Police should investigate such complaints — after all, these are often the same MPs are the first to criticise the Police and CYFS when a child dies at the hands of a violent carer.

Society is changing already, thanks in part to the investment the Government has already made in programmes to teach and support parents in learning non-violent ways to bring up their kids.
I think, even over the past year, there has been a substantial shift in public understanding and perception of the damage our culture of legitimised violence does to our children and families.

At Select Committee, it was heart-warming to hear stories from parents who used to beat their children but who have learned new methods, and are finding that family life is much happier and more fulfilling for adults and children alike as a result.

The Police and Courts will respond to these shifts in perception and culture too, but we must change the law to help make this happen. There are times when it is necessary for politicians to take a lead, and this is one of them.

The next few weeks are a crucial time for all of us who are committed to repeal, and I hope some of you will consider making approaches to MPs at electorate and national level to show your support, and to counter the fear tactics being used by some of those on the other side of this debate.

Fallout from the Kahui tragedy

I'd like to turn now, just briefly, to an associated topic, which is the political fallout from the tragic death of the Kahui twins. There was something about the fact that it was twins who were killed that touched everyone very deeply, no matter our political persuasion, yet of course the responses are highly politicised.

The nadir in the media came with Emerson's cartoon in the 'Herald' depicting a level of overt racism against Maori I can't remember seeing for decades, and in Parliament, from National using the tragedy as an opportunity for a renewed attack on an already inadequate benefit system.

The ideology of 'blame the victim, not the system' is alive and well in Aotearoa today. As usual, Maori and beneficiaries are right up front on the receiving end.

While I'm not for a moment suggesting that whoever killed these babies shouldn't be held to account for their actions, at the same time it is alarming the way in which this particular case has been used as an opportunity for a new assault by the Right on tangata whenua and the welfare system.

As always in politics, people are quick to take the easy way out, rather than looking at what lies underneath, and to fail to look for solutions that address the realities and complexities of the sort of situation the Kahui family epitomises.

I have been part of the nascent Cross Party Working Group on Family Violence set up in the wake of the Kahui twins' death, and I have to say that, so far, it has not been a particularly illuminating experience, functioning more as an information dump by Government on to us, rather than as a genuine dialogue across party lines.

Judith Collins and her National colleague Anne Tolley have walked out already, but I am staying on in the hope that something useful might be achieved. I think there is good will there, but parties in Parliament are not used to trying to work together in this way. There is no template to guide us, just generations of a political culture based on loyalty to one's own tribe and contempt for the rest.

I hope we will be able to begin to find constructive ways to talk to each other, and to work together on possible solutions to the shocking levels of violence against children in this country.

Of course I've been talking about one of those solutions already tonight — repealing section 59 is a key part of the equation.

But I'm as aware as anyone else that it's only one part of the mosaic, and that much more needs to be done.

I have read with interest the report put out in July this year by the NZ Council of Christian Social Services called 'Is any Progress Being Made in Care and Protection for NZ Children'?

This is an excellent summary of the issues compiled by representatives of some of the largest frontline social service agencies in Aotearoa.

It is also a damning indictment of progress so far. As NZCCSS describes graphically, there have been endless restructurings, reviews, reports and strategies over the last decade, aimed at improving the work of the child and family sector. Their conclusion is that all of this has not been good enough, and that 'in the area of support for families struggling with the nurture and safety of their children, policy and government initiatives have failed.'

And as the Ministry of Social Development themselves stated in September 2005: 'there has been no decline in the rates of reported abuse and neglect of children in recent years. Maori and Pacific children are at higher risk. The rate of child deaths from intentional injury shows no improvement'.

The people at Christian Council don't leave it there of course - they have a whole series of recommendations about actions this or any other Government could take to systematically improve services for children and families.

If I were the Minister of Social Development, I would simply take these proposals and action them — they are not new or controversial, just common sense,

To give just a few examples, they include recommendations that Government fund both CYFS and NGOs to pay social workers appropriately for the work they do; that Government commit to substantially increase resourcing for preventative social work; and that the CEOs of Health, Education, Corrections, Police and Social Development have specific care and protection annual goals that require demonstration of interagency cooperation.

Of course, solutions need to go way beyond the care and protection framework. MPs and society at large need to acknowledge the root causes of social alienation, like intergenerational unemployment and poverty, that leave some families completely outside positive and meaningful participation in most aspects of community life.

And, at a time of low unemployment like this, Government should be looking closely at whether, for example, it could do more in the way of front-on employment creation programmes that incorporate a whole range of features geared to those who have a multiplicity of problems keeping them outside the regular workforce.

What we shouldn't be doing is removing benefits and income-related rents, as Rodney Hide suggested in the House when debating the Kahui case. The consequences of that course of action are almost unimaginable in terms of a total descent into crime, violence, neglect and children who run the risk of being literally discarded, as we see in societies where infanticide or the killing of street kids are everyday evils.

Mothers with Babies in Prison

Finally, I'd just like to take a moment or two to give an update on my latest Private Member's Bill, as it is of particular interest I believe to groups like MAP, which is hosting us tonight.

I imagine most, if not all, of you are aware of my Corrections (Mothers with Babies) Amendment Bill that was drawn out of the ballot earlier this year. The twin key goals of this Bill are to stop breastfeeding being used as a disciplinary tool by prison staff, and to extend the length of time mothers can keep babies with them in prison from six months to two years.

In putting this Bill forward, I am not saying that I want to see any mothers with babies in prison — I would much rather this didn't happen at all, and that we had community based habilitation centres designed to accommodate their particular needs, rather than units inside existing facilities.

However, I see my little Bill as a political compromise which might achieve some good in the short term, while groups like yours, the Green Party, and others continue to work for better long-term solutions.

For those of you who might be wondering where my Bill has got to, submissions closed last month, and it is likely the Law and Order Select Committee will start hearing them by late October or early November. I will be sitting on the Committee for the purposes of this Bill, and I look forward to seeing some of you there.

This Bill was unusual in that it received unanimous support from all parties across the House, and for that reason I am hopeful that the process will be comparatively quick and uncontroversial, compared with that attending a certain other Private Member's Bill I've just been talking about. I would therefore hope that it would be back in the House and passed some time in the first quarter of next year.

In conclusion

In conclusion, I'd just like to thank all of you for taking the time to come along tonight, and for your interest in what is happening to children and young people in our country.

I'm very conscious that politics is very much an older peoples' game on the whole, and that the voices of children and teenagers are rarely heard, even when we're talking about things that affect them most of all.

The debate around s59 is a prize example of this.

We have had some input from young people themselves, but nowhere near enough. We have also, sadly, heard from some youngsters who have stood up in meetings or the Select Committee to say how much they appreciate being hit by their parents.

We have a long way to go in this country.

Thanks to all of you who are part of our work for a future in which all our babies have a chance to grow up free from violence, not just some of them.

Kia ora, kia manawanui, kia mau.