Posted on 10/06/2003 1:28:45 PM PDT by shaggy eel
The [New Zealand] government has given the clearest indication yet that smacking children will be against the law in two years.
Facing stinging international criticism of New Zealand's stance on corporal punishment, Social Development Minister Steve Maharey said the law which permits "reasonable force" by adults against their children would be gone in two years.
New Zealand has consistently been criticised by the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child for not repealing Section 59 of the Crimes Act. This section lets adults use reasonable force as a defence against child assault, but is not available as a defence against adults hitting adults.
Again this week, the UN committee expressed its "deep concern" that New Zealand had yet to ban all forms of corporal punishment. That followed Prime Minister Helen Clark's recent public backing for a repeal of Section 59.
But recent opinion polls suggest that more than 70 per cent of adults still believe it is okay to smack children and Mr Maharey has said New Zealand is not yet ready for the law to be changed.
Instead, the Government has provided $10 million for a two-year anti-smacking public education campaign.
Mr Maharey said the Cabinet had agreed to revisit Section 59 before the campaign's end, by which time he believed both the public and Parliament would be ready to amend the law.
In an effort to affect public perception before then, Government ministers have begun changing the way they talk about the repeal of Section 59, insisting that it is not a smacking ban.
They say parents would not be criminalised for disciplining their children, but that adults would no longer be able to escape conviction on charges of child assault by pleading reasonable force.
Meanwhile, New Zealand First MP Brian Donnelly has written a private member's bill that bans hitting a child around the head or using implements to punish them.
And the Greens have drafted a new bill repealing Section 59 altogether, saying that allowing children to be smacked added to the culture of abuse in New Zealand.
Both member's bills would need to be drawn from a ballot held every second Wednesday before they could be debated.
ACT has also lashed out at the UN for espousing idealism "that is unrealistic in our world".
"If the UN wants to tell us what to do, then it should at least come to New Zealand and see things first-hand," Social Welfare spokeswoman Muriel Newman said.
,,, I guess we could reasonably assume that. What a mandate!
A smack would have been welcome!
,,, ha! There's thinking outside the square. The reality is that a lot of the "to be" guilty parties under this proposed removal of legislation will be the Labour government's own voters.
,,, that's OK, NZ is building lots of prisons and detention centres. The US could put you behind bars downunder for a whole lot cheaper when you take the exchange rate into account. Book your cell now - we can do it off the plans! Three good meals a day and all the TV you can watch.
I agree. A swat on the butt can reinforce the message without doing any physical harm. With young children, a verbal message sometimes benefits from a little reinforcement. A smack on the face, however, is never called for.
It is much the same with training a pet. You don't want to make them afraid of your hand. There needs to be a fundamental relationship of trust. Touch is an important part of that.
With pets -- and probably also with children, although to a lesser degree -- the timing of the swat is also important.
My dog sometimes runs off. When he comes home, my gut instinct is to punish him. But that is wrong. He will think he is being punished for returning home.
You have to deliver the swat right when they are right in the process of doing the act you wish to discourage. It also does not need to be painful. Loud is good, however. I got my dog when he was about one year old. He had apparently been mistreated by his original owners. Probably by children. He would trust me, but he wouldn't let anyone else get near him.
It took two years for him to get over all that. Mostly over it, anyway -- he'll probably never be fully over it.
Definitely comes under "cruel" punishment (unless it's "all you can bear and no more").
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