Women’s Refuge says the result of the referendum was a predictable outcome due to the phrasing of the question, “Should a smack, as part of good parental correction, be a criminal offence in New Zealand?”
Heather Henare, Chief Executive for the National Collective of Independent Women’s Refuges, says “The result is disappointing, but not a great surprise. The question was framed from the outset to capture a “no” vote.
“Most people believe that firm boundaries for children are necessary and many do not see a smack as a problem. Of course they don’t want to see parents criminalised over this issue.”
“What is being missed is the fact that good parents are not being criminalised under the amended law at all.”
“The referendum question assumes that smacking can be part of good parental correction. In fact, any degree of physical hitting sends a message to children that violence is acceptable. In almost every case, there will be times when those slaps or blows will be harder than they should have been, when anger becomes part of the equation.”
Ms Henare says, “Women’s Refuge supports non-violent, positive parenting. Contrary to popular opinion, this does not mean an absence of boundaries or parental responsibility. There are honest, sensible ways to establish clear boundaries for children that do not involve smacking.”
“We believe the existing child discipline law is an important step towards changing attitudes towards family violence. It would be a great shame if this country were to take a step backwards in that respect and change the law back to allow the physical punishment of children.”
“I have personally spoken with families who have had issues with violence for generations. They have said the law was one of the things that supported their decision to make their home violence-free. They talk of the freedom of knowing that violence towards their children is no longer an option.”
Ms Henare says, “We are calling on the government to retain the current child discipline law.”
A review of the law is due to be completed later this year. Ms Henare says, “That is when we should be evaluating it. I sincerely hope the government will wait for the report and not support changes based on the outcome of this confusing referendum.”
The Dean of Auckland’s Anglican Cathedral of the Holy Trinity, The Very Reverend Ross Bay, has expressed concern at the attitude of some Christians that it is their God-given right to use corporal punishment in the discipline of their children.
Commenting in the light of the recent referendum on the use of smacking, Dean Bay says that the view of some Christians is based in an image of God that characterises God as ready to punish human beings for the slightest misdemeanour. “The Christian image of God is what we find in the New Testament of the Bible, and is the God revealed to us in Jesus Christ,” says Dean Bay. “This is the God who does not wield power to force human beings to conform to divine purposes. What we see in Jesus is self-giving love poured out in a surrender to evil. The power of that divine love is what in turn overcomes evil.”
Dean Bay says that this activity of God in the death and resurrection of Jesus should always be the starting point for a Christian image of God that affects human behaviour. Jesus’ attitude to children is seen in his welcoming them for blessing when the adults around him are telling them and trying to send them away. Dean Bay says that it is unfortunate that these images are made secondary to an approach founded in the ancient proverb of ‘spare the rod and spoil the child’.
“I am concerned that a particular stance on child discipline has too often been characterised as ‘the’ Christian view. Many Christians would think quite differently in relation to this matter”.
Nevertheless the Dean takes a realistic view about this issue. “The irony of the referendum is that people were being asked to affirm something for which the current law already makes provision. If there is an issue to be addressed it is around the interpretation and application of Section 59 by Police and CYFS. Hopefully the Prime Minister’s announcement on Monday will offer some clear guidance in this regard”.
Meantime the Dean hopes that the image of the God of love and mercy revealed in Jesus Christ will be the image which characterises all human relationships, especially relationships where one person holds power over another.
The National Council of Women of New Zealand (NCWNZ) will continue to support a law that allows children to grow up free from violence, regardless of the referendum results.
In 1997 NCWNZ passed a resolution by majority that called for the repeal of Section 59 of the Crimes Act 1961 so that children could be afforded the same legal protection from assault as adults.
NCWNZ applauds the law changes that followed and urges the government to stand by the decision made in 2007 to protect children from unjust physical punishment.
“There needs to be more education around the current law and more information around the benefits of positive parenting over physical discipline,” says Elizabeth Bang, NCWNZ National President.
Studies have shown that rewards are more effective than punishment in terms of modifying behaviour for the better. The use of physical punishment has also been shown to produce overwhelmingly negative lifelong consequences and condition the individual to view violence as a solution.
“If it’s not an effective discipline solution and has harmful side effects on the individual and society”, says Elizabeth Bang, “why would anyone ever use physical discipline”.
NCWNZ believes the law is working and that the child-rearing practices of many New Zealanders are being positively affected.
“The child discipline law gives our kids the possibility to grow up in a society that over time will become less violent,” says Elizabeth Bang, “that’s a good thing”.
On behalf of Parents Centres New Zealand Inc and our 52 affiliated Centres across New Zealand Chief Executive Officer Viv Gurrey, says “The result of this referendum does not provide a distinct and clear mandate for changing a law that is proven to be working” .
“Our membership urges the National led government and all Members of Parliament to wait for the outcome of the planned review of the law” before considering (if any) action.
“Now we have the loaded, confusing and ambiguous referendum behind us, let’s rely on hard facts and data to inform decisions”.
“It is more than enough that we have gone to an unnecessary expense to feed the egos of some in our society that appear to be obsessed with their personal right to hit a child. Let’s not compound this further by making change without supporting facts”.
“These facts state categorically that this law is working” says Gurrey. “Parents Centres have no doubt that this trend will continue”.
Parents Centres considers the referendum question was obtuse in its intent. Those who poll professionally are very aware that the result you achieve depends specifically on the question you ask. If you ask people if they want something that looks bad, dishonest or false to happen the majority will say no. In this referendum the question is framed up as good parents being made into criminals.
It suggested that hitting children was good parenting practice and those ‘good’ parents are being criminalised when neither is true. Because of this, we are aware that some people preferred to abstain from voting or even to vote no despite being supporters of the current law.
“Many credible agencies and individuals who touch the lives of parents and children daily have taken the opportunity that this referendum has offered to better inform people about the law and about positive parenting”.
Research is showing that growing numbers of parents recognise there is no need to use physical punishment and the law is consistent with this shift in public attitudes and behaviour. Parents Centre would like to see increased public education about the law and further resources made available to support sector organisations in their provision of service”.
Mrs Gurrey concludes by saying “Parents Centres will continue to focus on providing the essential support and education to parents that they need to raise healthy and confident children able to contribute positively to society in a resilient home environment free from physical discipline”.
“Barnardos New Zealand continues to support the child discipline law as the best option for New Zealand because it sets a clear standard that children should be allowed to live free from violence,” Barnardos Chief Executive Murray Edridge said tonight.
“The referendum did not ask a direct question about people’s acceptance or otherwise of the law. It suggested that hitting children was good parenting practice and that ‘good’ parents are being criminalised when neither is true. Because of this, we are aware that some people preferred to abstain from voting even though they strongly support the current law.
“As such, the referendum doesn’t provide any clear mandate for change. We urge Members of Parliament to wait for the outcome of the review of the law because it will deal with the facts and provide an objective and dispassionate view of how the law is working.
“Change to the law should not be considered now but rather an ongoing monitoring programme should be established – using sound measures to monitor the law’s impact and effects. There should also be increased public education about the law and positive, non-physical discipline.
“The referendum was a great opportunity for Barnardos, and the long list of other credible agencies working with children and families, to better inform people about the law and about positive parenting. Research is showing that growing numbers of parents recognise there is no need to use physical punishment and the law is consistent with this shift in public attitudes and behaviour.
“We are pleased that 11 percent of the votes expressed support for the law and we are confident that over time even higher numbers of Kiwis will acknowledge the need for the law as it now stands,” concluded Mr Edridge.
The outcome of the child discipline referendum, announced this evening, was always a foregone conclusion, given the confusing and leading question that it asked, says the Yes Vote coalition, which supports the law as it stands.
“The Yes Vote ran a positive, constructive campaign that attracted the support of hundreds of organisations that deal daily with children and families, and thousands of individuals who reject physical punishment as effective parenting,” said the coalition’s spokesperson, Deborah Morris-Travers.
“We ran the Yes Vote campaign because we believed it was important to have a voice that stood up for children.
“We’re proud to have made that positive contribution, and applaud the political courage of the current Parliament in sticking with the law as it stands.”
While it had cost NZ$9 million, was divisive and unnecessary, the referendum had not been totally without value, Ms Morris-Travers said.
“Strong evidence emerged during the referendum period that smacking is dying out among today’s parents. Good parents are looking for better ways to raise their children, and increasingly questioning the outdated notion of ‘spare the rod and spoil the child’.
“By equating smacking with good parenting, even the referendum’s question helped deepen public debate on the issue, since large numbers of both Yes and No voters reject that notion.
“With the law as it stands working well, I suspect we will look back in 10 years time and wonder what all the fuss was about.”
The Boston Globe reports on recent US research on smacking. Some quotes from Murray Straus, founder of the Family Research Laboratory at the University of New Hampsire:
“Suppose there are two medicines that work, but one has harmful side effects that don’t show up for 10 or 20 years. Even if one dose has only a tiny chance of an adverse effect, I think parents would want to avoid that risk. That’s the way they should think about spanking” –
When asked, “Can you think of a situation when it’s OK for a husband to slap a wife in the face,” almost half of those who had grown up being spanked regularly (three or more times a week) said yes.
“If you want your child to grow up to be the kind of person who reasons instead of hits,” he says, “I can’t imagine why any parent would ever spank.”
The current law (section 59 of the Crimes Act) not only gives children the right to protection from violence, but by removing violence as a ‘backstop option’ it paves the way for every parent to ‘think outside of the box’ and develop new parenting skills.
Mary Willow, a Wellington parent educator, recently gave 2 well-received seminars on Positive Parenting.
“Parents who use smacking say ‘you can talk till you’re blue in the face but they just don’t listen, so how are we supposed to discipline them?’ The pro-smackers have one thing right,” says Mary, “the child’s willpower and actions in the early years learn primarily through non-verbal experience. But what kind of experience is best?”
“As parenting expert Haim Ginnott once said: ‘We (parents) are the decisive element in the child’s life. It’s our personal approach that creates the climate, it’s our daily mood that makes the weather”.
Mary explains: “A large percentage of un-cooperative behaviour in children is created when we set them and ourselves up for failure. We do this through poor management of time, lack of rhythm, being distracted or overcommitted, having unrealistic expectations of tired, hungry, sick or over-stimulated children (or parents!), having inconsistent or non-existent boundaries, exhibiting poor self-control or being extreme in our reactions one way or another.”
“To add to the above, when children start to act up, we try to use reasoning (which they don’t yet have) and coercion (verbal or physical, which they imitate perfectly) to rein them in” says Mary. “The primary mode of learning in the early years is imitation. When we hit our children to discipline them, we create yet another generation of New Zealand parents lacking positive parenting skills.”
So what can we do?
“If we first work on adjusting the rhythm, environment and parental example to set both children and parents up for success, we can then focus on the small amount of ‘stuck’ behaviour that remains. This requires an understanding of how children learn at different stages and how to create successful, non-violent boundaries, both of which I teach in my seminars, playgroups, courses and counselling sessions”.
“The wonderful thing about struggling to become good parents is that it helps us to heal past wounds and move on to new levels of wisdom and creativity. You don’t wait till the last kid has left home to run off and get enlightened: if you focus and take positive parenting seriously you will be enlightened every single day!”
“My dream is that the courage of Sue Bradford to bring this law change into effect will ultimately breed a new kind of parenting in New Zealand where we help and support each other, and families grow together in joy and security.”
The Yes Vote coalition rejects today’s New Zealand Herald story claiming that the coalition has “flouted” referendum spending limit rules.
“If anything, staying within the advertising rules has taken a disproportionate amount of time and effort to interpret and comply with,” said Yes Vote spokesperson Deborah Morris-Travers. “We’ve had extensive and regular consultations with the Chief Electoral Office on how to interpret the advertising rules, and the clear advice has been that the Yes Vote campaign, branded as such, is a distinct campaign in itself.
“Our advice has been that the spending cap applies to distinct campaigns, as opposed to the possibility that one or more groups might mount their own campaigns.
“Far from flouting the regulations, we have tried to be scrupulous about following them, which makes today’s story doubly disappointing,” Ms Morris-Travers said.
In a Morning Report story today, Paediatrics Society spokesperson Russell Wills says that attitudes toward violence are changing. Parents are now approaching medical professionals saying, “I know I’m not allowed to hit my kids – can you help me?”.
The story points out that in the 2007-2008 CYF reporting year, although notifications involving smacking are up, cases requiring futher action have dropped – indicating that the law is working.
If you are going to use or distribute material from our campaign in any way, eg remixed or mashed up, please ensure that your actions are compliant with the relevant legislation, as the Yes Vote Coalition cannot take responsibility for actions beyond our control or knowledge.
The bottom line is that we want to play by the rules. We appreciate your support, but please act ethically, thoughtfully, and within the law.
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