Prasad Rajen: Vulnerable Children Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumePrasad Rajen: Vulnerable Children Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 15 April 2014. Volume:698;Page:17268. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Dr RAJEN PRASAD (Labour): I am pleased to take a call in the second reading of the Vulnerable Children Bill. Whenever it comes to debating bills of this type in this House I have had reason to reflect on the many years I have spent working with vulnerable families and vulnerable children training social workers to work in this field and indeed researching and writing about many aspects of vulnerable children and vulnerable families. When I do that reflection I recall all of the actions we have taken. My experience goes back to 1971. Every time there is a proposal to improve the lives of vulnerable children a few years later when we look at the effects of thoseproposals we scratch our heads and ask why it did not achieve its effect. Why is it that now we end up in the 21st century with such a poor record when it comes to child abuse and neglect? How did that happen when since 1971 I can recall we have had the kinds of speeches we are having in the House now—the comments to the effect that we have found the answer and that when we put these matters into legislation and when they are practised things will be that much better? I just wish I had that confidence. Nothing I have heard so far gives me that confidence.That is not a reason not to support this bill. We have every reason to support this and indeed we do but it is a matter for quiet reflection on what it is that we ought to be doing that we are not doing. The question haunts me. Why do we as a country have such an alarming rate of abuse and neglect? The refrain is: will these sets of provisions make the difference? We can go further in asking those questions. Why is it that a certain section of our communities live lives of quiet desperation often producing the harm if you like that we are designing approaches to resolve? So why does that happen and why do those communities and those individuals and those families live lives of quiet desperation? Why are the poor and to some extent certain ethnic groups overrepresented in this field and why do we not have conversations about that? Why do we not begin to address those things a lot more comprehensively? And then the refrain is: will this set of provisions enable us to improve the lives of the vulnerable in a comprehensive kind of fashion? And the answer is maybe maybe not. But still the sadness remains.Why are there so many cases where subsequent generations produce the same effects? It is not as if we did not know about them. It is not as if these families and these children have not come to the consciousness of some official. It might be a teacher it might be a Plunket nurse it might be a recreation person or it might be somebody else in the community such as a doctor or a nurse and down the track colleagues at work etc. Why is it that despite our knowing of them—and many of these cases have been identified and referred to the agencies and others who work on improving the lives of the vulnerable—we fall short and we fall short so seriously? So we then begin to ask questions about the quality of our interventions. We can create the best set of legislative provisions but it will not make a damn bit of difference if we do not have the right type of people—highly trained people—to operationalise the intention of the legislation. We have known about abuse and neglect for so long. We have known for so long where it occurs yet we have not been able to bring together a comprehensive set of provisions to protect the most vulnerable. Will this set of provisions do that? I am not so sure but I hope that they will.We can reflect on our adult justice system and it is littered—it is littered—with those who were vulnerable much earlier on in life. It is littered. Why does that happen? In fact we treat them in such a way that they become the abusers of tomorrow and therefore we have to look at ourselves as well. So what is the extent to which these provisions I first looked at—why do we fail? Why are the billions we have spent and the provisions we have made not working? These matters worry me. They worry me as a parent they worry me as a grandparent seeing young children they worry me as a previous practitioner in this field and they now worry me as a member of this particular Parliament. Over the past almost 6 years I have sat in this House and watched the various provisions we have tried to come up with to address this issue and we have always supported any good idea. This Opposition has supported the good idea to say: “Well maybe these sets of provisions will make a difference.” But at times I worry that the other sub-context or the other sub-conversation if you like—the other conversation that goes on—is the way in which we also heap a lot of criticism on these families as well. We have done it even recently. Whenever we talk about welfare abuse wheneverwe talk about dependency or whenever we talk about those going overseas for a holiday when they ought not to be—whenever we do that we are pointing a finger at a whole bunch of people who are the vulnerable from whom these families come.So on this particular occasion there is no need not to support these provisions because the provisions themselves will make some difference. Coming to the specific things in the bill because we share the concern amongst New Zealanders we do support the provisions here but will these provisions be enough? I do not know. This bill addresses the vulnerability of about 30000 children but the vulnerable whom we know of are about 300000 children yet we are not actually focusing on that in any comprehensive kind of way. Those who are at risk if you like are a much larger pool and these provisions address some of those. So in maybe another 20 years’ time somebody else will be standing here giving a very similar speech asking why in 2014 our provisions were not more comprehensive because those who are living in poverty are vulnerable yet our provisions do not get to them.What we require is a more comprehensive action plan for children that will produce a paradigm shift in the way in which our society thinks about the vulnerable because there is something wrong with New Zealand society when it comes to violence. We are very very tolerant of violence. No matter what we say in this House this society is very tolerant of violence—whether it is violence against our children whether it is violence against our women whether it is violence of men against men or whether indeed it is in the way in which we conduct ourselves in our language etc. It is somehow ingrained in the psyche and the personality of New Zealand. We are not addressing it and that wider conversation is not taking place. So this particular bill looks at some aspects of that and those we do not argue with. I am glad that there will be a much more comprehensive look at those families who have had vulnerable children producing others. It will look at that.So there are many many aspects of this bill that are worth supporting but unless we have highly trained people who are capable of identifying the cases and bringing together high-quality programmes to produce the change that is required this bill will be suboptimal in its effects. But it is still a bill worth supporting. There are some good ideas here and others will talk about those during the Committee stage. Thank you.