Crimes (Abolition of Force as a Justification for Child Discipline) Amendment Bill

Go to audio of Sue's speech (mp3, 9:33, 1.7MB).

Madam Speaker,

I move that the Crimes (Abolition of Force as a Justification for Child Discipline) Amendment Bill be now read a second time.

We are engaging in an historic debate this afternoon. It appears that a majority of MPs in this House, including some from nearly every party represented here, are going to vote for this bill to proceed to the next stage of the parliamentary process.

I know that MPs have various and at times contradictory reasons for supporting my bill through its second reading, but nevertheless I would like to thank all of you in advance for being willing enough to show leadership and take some personal political risk on an issue which divides our country deeply.

In engaging in public debates around New Zealand and in hearing the submissions during our long Select Committee process, it is clear to me that this issue of repeal of s59 cuts deep into the national psyche.

All I am seeking to do is to get rid of a law which allows a defence of 'reasonable force' when parents beat, hit or otherwise assault their children. Removing this defence would give our offspring the same protection we are kind enough to extend to other adults, police officers and animals but not to our babies, children and young people.

Opponents of repeal continue to argue that somehow parents have an inalienable and indeed at times God-given right to hit their children in the name of discipline.

For example, listen to this extract from one of the submissions opposing the bill.

'Like most children ours are strong willed… their wills are untamed and often applied in ways that can be disruptive or dangerous. They should be taught to respect others…and this requires bending their wills, which in turn requires force.'

This submitter, in her unassuming way, reflects an underlying attitude towards children, which my bill is very directly trying to change.

When Pakeha colonists first got here we brought a culture that taught that children - along with women and servants - were the property of their father and husband, and that they were mere chattels to be brought into line by force.

Section 59 is the last legal vestige of that culture. It is no longer legal for employers to beat employees or servants, or for husbands to beat wives. It is still, in the supposedly enlightened 21st century, within the law for parents to beat children.

Our babies and children are physically smaller and know a lot less about the world than we parents do. Surely our job as parents should be to nurture and protect them until they reach independent adulthood, not to use force to physically coerce them into submission.

The Unicef report released last week makes this point very clearly. The damning figures on child safety contained in the Innocenti report and our low status compared to other developed countries are an indictment of the way we view and treat children in this country, as second class citizens not deserving of the same rights and protections as adults.

The piece of legislation in front of us today is a small but necessary step towards beginning to turn these attitudes around.

The Select Committee worked hard on this Bill. We received thousands of written submissions and heard hundreds of submitters in person.

As a result of the Committee process my original bill has been substantially amended. However, I would like to make it very clear that the bill which has come back to the House still clearly reflects my original intention, to abolish the use of parental force for the purposes of correction.

Some supporters of repeal of s59 have been concerned that somehow the bill now waters down that intention, or in some way allows parents to legally still use force as punishment.

This is not the case. The intention of the new amendment is simply to clarify that no parent will be prosecuted for restraining their children when — for example — they are acting to prevent them from hurting another person or themselves, or to stop them from engaging in offensive or disruptive behaviour. The new amendment does not provide a justification of the use of force for the purpose of disciplining a child.

On the other hand, my Select Committee colleague from the National Party, Mr Chester Borrows, has made it very clear that he intends to put up a different amendment during the Committee stages in the House aimed at defining reasonable force for the purposes of correction.

I will be fighting that amendment tooth and nail, as I believe it is the worst possible thing we could do in terms of legitimising the use of force against our children. I know that Mr Borrows is well meaning, but unfortunately, he, like others who want to somehow define reasonable force, doesn't seem to accept or understand that this is the worst possible thing we could do.

The effect of any attempt to define reasonable force, including Mr Borrows', is that we then have the state telling parents that we should hit our kids in some ways and not in others, and that it is still perfectly OK to use force on children and babies that we wouldn't consider using on adults who are actually much more able to look after themselves.

Defining acceptable force also undermines the fantastic work being done by church and community groups all over New Zealand teaching and supporting parents to use other ways of bringing up their children that don't involve the use of physical discipline.

Our country has made some progress in ensuring domestic violence against adults is unacceptable and illegal even inside the privacy of the home. It is high time we gave children the same protection as we give adults, and bring an end to the situation in which police are able to prosecute a husband for assaulting his wife but do not prosecute him for assaulting his child because he has a defence under section 59.

The debate around repeal is very intense and I think it is good that we are having a national discussion on an issue of such concern to so many New Zealanders.

However, some of the opposition to repeal has been lead by a very small group who claim to represent Christians. Of the two million in the last census with any Christian affiliation I believe it is only a small minority who would subscribe to the belief of some that children are little bundles of depravity who deserve and in fact need to have sin beaten out of them even as toddlers.

The leadership of the Christian churches and many individual Christians have disassociated themselves from such statements, but I think it is a pity that the views of the vociferous minority have dominated this aspect of the debate when so many people of faith believe that in fact the attitude of Jesus to children is one of welcome and kindness. Nowhere does Jesus advocate physical punishment, the infliction of pain upon children, and nor is he reported to have advised any parent to use physical discipline against children.

Some of the opposition to repeal has been even more extreme than that of the most immoderate of the Christians. Just today there have been postings on the CYFS Watch website, talking about the possibility of assassinating me and with one contributor saying for example that: quote 'I would like the opportunity to drive my fist straight into her face as hard as I can, hopefully breaking her nose or jaw in the process…' There is more but I am not keen on repeating it.

A later posting asks anyone who knows my residential address to send it in so the website can publish it so that quote 'MPs should no more be immune from consequences than the rest of us.'

I wouldn't normally relate this kind of thing to the House but I do it for two reasons today.

One, because I think the best response to this kind of intimidation is to make sure as many people as possible know about it, and that it is not going to silence me or all the others who are working for this bill; and secondly because I think comments like these indicate the violent nature of some of those who so fiercely defend the rights of parents to legally assault their children.

Finally, a few words on criminalisation. Much of the opposition to this bill has been driven by those who are spreading the message that if section 59 is abolished suddenly tens of thousands of loving parents will find themselves arrested by police and prosecuted by courts for lightly and occasionally smacking their child.

While it is true that, if this bill succeeds, use of force for correction will technically be an offence, this does not mean that our already very stretched police force will be taking this kind of action. Police investigate maltreatment of a child only after a complaint. The investigation takes into account a whole series of guidelines such as the facts of the case, how serious the offence is and whether there are alternatives to prosecution.

Many minor and technical assaults take place in this country every day that are not investigated, and/or where no prosecution eventuates. This situation will not change with the passing of this bill.

There has been a real campaign of fear created around criminalisation and I am sorry that so many parents have felt so unnecessarily threatened.

The time has come to change this archaic law.

My bill on its own won't change the culture of violence against children in this country, but it is one of a wide range of measures that are necessary if we are ever going to be able to hold our heads high in the community of nations as a country that really is a great place to bring up kids.