Copeland Gordon: Crimes (Substituted Section 59) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Copeland Gordon: Crimes (Substituted Section 59) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:638;Page:8452] 
GORDON COPELAND (United Future) 
: 
 I would like to speak to clause 3. It is very very clear and unambiguous in its language that the purpose of this bill is to abolish the use of parental force for the purpose of correction. It is quite interesting that the clause includes the concept of abolition because it is actually the 200th anniversary at this time of the abolition of the trans-Atlantic trade in slavery. That indeed was something that needed to be abolished. 
But I want to question tonight in this Chamber whether it is a good idea to abolish correction by parents of their children. I think that that leads us straight into a consideration of what it is we are trying to abolish. If we look at the  
Shorter Oxford English Dictionary 
 we find that correction means “The action of putting right or indicating errors.” We are going to abolish that here tonight. The definition further states that correction is “Reproof of a person for a fault of character or conduct.” We are saying that we are going to abolish that here tonight. Justice Fisher in a 2003 case said: “Correction implies that the object of the punishment was to deter repetition of improper conduct.” This Committee is asked to accept tonight that we should be abolishing that. 
I find that very very ironic because we actually have a Department of Corrections in this country and the State has no problem at all in correcting people—through arrest and imprisonment—with the object of deterring a repetition of improper conduct. That is what our Department of Corrections is set up to do. People have said that we should treat children in the same way as adults. Well I for one am not keen to send children to prison. I think there is a vast difference between a child and an adult when it comes to correction. But my real fear is that if we do not correct our children when they are children—that is punish them to “deter repetition of improper conduct”—then we greatly increase the risk that the State will have to correct them as adults. That is the purpose of correction. 
The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child specifically recognises the right of parents to train and discipline their children. This bill actually contravenes that convention and it is a nonsense to pretend otherwise. Therefore— 
Jill Pettis 
: So you can only discipline by force? 
GORDON COPELAND 
: Well that is the only thing we are abolishing. As Taito Phillip Field and others have pointed out we are leaving in correction through yelling and screaming at children telling children they are no good and putting children down. In my experience with many many people over many years in counselling and otherwise that does a great deal more damage to a child than does a smack—a great deal more damage. There is no comparison between the two. I know lots and lots of people who say: “My life is screwed up because when I was a kid I was told I was no good. I would never amount to anything.” That does grave damage to a child. We are not abolishing that—that is OK—but a smack is wrong. I think it is exactly the other way around. 
I will give members this analogy. Why do we put a needle into our child’s veins and inoculate him or her against disease? Is that painful? Is that an assault on a child? Of course it is. But why do we do it? We do it because we love that child. We do it because we want that child to be able to live a healthy life. That is a good goal. Quite frankly the goal—the purpose—behind why we smack a child is all-important. One can do that in love. One can do that to correct a child’s behaviour so that that child will grow up to be a good peace-loving non-violent person. That is in the best interests of the child. That is what motivates loving parents; they love their kids enough to discipline them. 
A lady said to me the other day: “You know there was a little beggar next door and his mother gave him a good hiding. I went across and said to her: ‘I see you gave the child a hiding.’ The mother said: ‘You’re not going to tell the police are you?’. I said to her: ‘No but I would have told the police had you not given him a hiding.’ ” That woman actually realised of course that that child needed some discipline—he needed some boundaries. All the psychologists and all the people who study child behaviour will tell us that if children do not learn boundaries as children they will learn them as adults in the hands of the police and in the hands of the Department of Corrections. That is a stupid thing to be doing.