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Child advocacy groups have welcomed a select committee report on Green MP Sue Bradford's anti-smacking bill but said they were concerned about a compromise clause.
Ms Bradford's bill will change the Crimes Act to remove the defence of "reasonable force" that parents can invoke if charged with assaulting
a child.
But the select committee that approved the bill yesterday forced a compromise which will permit parents to use reasonable force to exercise necessary parental control.
This would include restraining a child to prevent it from harm, or from causing others harm, or to prevent it engaging in disruptive behaviour.
The Families Commission said the justice and law reform select committee's proposed bill moved in the right direction but fell short of the mark.
Families Commission deputy chief commissioner Sharron Cole said the select committee did not send a strong clear message that violence towards children was not acceptable.
"In attempting to address parents' concerns about criminalisation it raises more difficulties than it solves," she said.
"However, we are hopeful that these issues can be addressed by way of amendment at the second reading of the bill."
Ms Cole said New Zealand was at a "tipping point" where public outrage and concern at the levels of violence could be used to bring about social change.
"The Families Commission is very clear that no form of family violence is acceptable."
Ms Cole said it was recognised that the committee had a difficult task and the members have worked very hard to meet some of the concerns raised by the public.
"The bill does remove the 'reasonable force' defence that parents can use when charged with assaulting their children but at the same time it introduces clauses that undermine this," she said.
Children's Commissioner Cindy Kiro said she was glad the committee agreed the law had been used "to justify child abuse, with cases of parents or caregivers using riding crops or implements to punish children".
But she had serious concerns about replacing that section of the Crimes Act with the parental control clause.
"We need to repeal it, full stop," Dr Kiro said. "We don't need to substitute it with another section that still allows reasonable force under a list of still unclear circumstances that are open to interpretation."
Although the new clause banned use of force for disciplinary purposes, she believed the definition would lead to confusion and argument about what was reasonable, and this issue needed further debate.
Every Child Counts spokeswoman Deborah Morris-Travers raised similar concerns but "welcomed the efforts of MPs to reach a compromise", and Barnardos said it had supported a full repeal.
But Family First national director Bob McCoskrie said the bill should "cause parents to shiver in their boots".
"We have just heard about the right of a teenager to effectively 'divorce' their parent because they don't like the family rules, a 12-year-old being sneaked off to get contraceptives by their school and now this bill.
"Parents should be horrified by the way their authority and responsibilities are being undermined."
The Greens, Labour and the Maori Party yesterday said all their MPs would vote for the bill, as will several New Zealand First MPs.
Ms Bradford said she hoped United Future leader Peter Dunne, National MP Katherine Rich and possibly other National MPs would also vote in favour.
- NZHERALD STAFF / NZPA
