Smacking, it’s the incredibly unpopular law change that just won’t go away.
Almost half of parents with children under 12 have smacked them in the past year, a survey has found.
The Family First lobby group commissioned a market research company to poll New Zealanders on their attitudes to parental discipline since the anti-smacking law came into effect in June last year.
It found that 48 per cent of respondents with children under 12 had smacked their child after the law change.
Now, there’s one mistake here. this is not a survey of those who have smacked, it’s a survey of those who would admit that to a pollster. Let’s face it, would you admit to (what the law now says is) abusing your children to a person on the telephone? Because of that, I’d call these numbers a minimum.
“For a new law to be ignored by so many people who are willing to risk a police or [Child, Youth and Family] investigation indicates just how out of step with reality this law is.”
Again, I disagree with Bob. Sue Bradford is up and front the person to thank for this after she told us all so many, many times that good parents had nothing to fear.
Ms Bradford said yesterday that the new poll indicated an improvement in attitudes, as a year on only 48 per cent admitted having done so.
“We are well on the way; that is a great result,” she said.
On the way to what? After all, Sue Bradford herself said…
this is an anti-beating, anti-child-violence bill, not a piece of legislation that will see tens of thousands of well-meaning parents dragged into court for the occasional light smack…
Why would any well-meaning parent stop giving the occasional light smack when the woman behind the bill says that’s fine? So where exactly are we supposed to be “on the way” to?
Men, people aged more than 60 and those from rural areas opposed it most strongly.
He said only 19 per cent strongly or somewhat agreed with the new law despite the police discretion clause, down from 29 per cent last year.
If The Green’s recent form is anything to go by, expect a law to go through shortly “readjusting the inequality of voting between rural and urban areas”. ;P
I most love this bit thought!
Mr McCoskrie said 85 per cent of those polled – up from 82 per cent a year ago – agreed the new law should be changed to state that parents who gave their children a smack that was reasonable and for the purpose of correction were not breaking the law.
Because that would be a repeal of the law! 😀
Children’s Commissioner Cindy Kiro said yesterday that she had not seen the survey.
But she urged people to move on and learn better parenting skills.
“The key message is, ‘For goodness sake, can’t we move on?’ So much energy has been wasted debating this.”
Dr Kiro said people needed to learn and be encouraged in positive parenting.
Methinks someone is feeling the heat in a big way. As Lindsay points out…
That’s an interesting attitude in itself. Very. It reveals that the Children’s Commissioner does not care for discussion or debate when it comes to what she wants to do. To those of us who would put up objections, the key message is actually, “you are wasting your energy”. Presumably we will be wasting our energy opposing any other of her initiatives like mandatory screening of every baby’s home life.
I wonder how many people are on a plane to Australia because Kiro, Bradford and Clark are not?
Something should go here, maybe later. 