Kedgley Sue: Corrections (Mothers with Babies) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Kedgley Sue: Corrections (Mothers with Babies) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
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SUE KEDGLEY (Green) 
: 
 I am absolutely delighted to support Sue Bradford’s bill. I note that in a letter she sent to all MPs she said: “I believe how we treat mothers who have babies while they are in prison is an issue of such common humanity that it transcends traditional party lines.” Indeed this debate has proven exactly that. We have had an outbreak of cross-party unity the likes of which we have not seen for many months in this Parliament and is it not fantastic? Should we not celebrate when an issue comes out that so unites us? 
It is just as well that it has united us because all of us last year before the election signed up to the “children first” accord. All of us promised that we would put the interests of children first. The whole thing was about giving children the best start in life. If this bill is measured by that then there is no question: this bill puts the needs of the child first and focuses on giving children the best start in life. That overriding objective must be given priority over other desires such as the desire to punish or the desire to seek revenge. The wonder is that it has taken so long to make this simple but extremely significant policy change. It was interesting that the Minister of Justice said the Ministry of Justice was looking at this issue. 
One part of me asks whether we really need a whole lengthy legislative process. Do we need submissions and a lengthy debate? Why cannot we have a simple regulatory change? The arguments are so overwhelming and so compelling; why cannot we just make the change and make it tomorrow? But from listening to the debate I see that there are some very important issues that we can explore and would be worth exploring in the select committee. These are issues around parenting education having a parental contract and so forth. Those are really important issues and I welcome the fact that they will be debated in the select committee in the same cross-party constructive spirit we have seen here tonight. 
If we put the interests of the child first we just have to support this bill. As others have said there is overwhelming international consensus that breastfeeding is best for every baby that it is the basic right of every baby. We know that it is the ideal nutrition. We know that every child who has been breastfed for as long as possible will have a better start in life. It will have reduced risks of all sorts of diseases and therefore will be healthier and will require less support from the State later on. 
Of course the issue of bonding is absolutely crucial and others have talked about it. It was interesting to learn how disastrous and how traumatising it is for a mother to have her baby forcibly taken away from her. In a former life I wrote a book about the history of motherhood. From the 1930s right through until the 1970s babies were automatically taken away from mothers for up to about 3 days then were wheeled out on trolleys from a central nursery but they were kept away from the mother for 14 or more days. I interviewed many mothers for my book. All of them had found the experience devastating and traumatising. All of them felt that it had undermined their bonding and in many cases had undermined their efforts to breastfeed. 
 So if it is traumatic for mothers to have their babies taken away in a hospital situation for 14 days how much more traumatic it must be for mothers to have their babies taken away at 6 months for 18 months or so. Obviously a mother who is devastated and traumatised by having her baby taken away from her will have much greater difficulty in being rehabilitated. So as well as benefiting the baby—which I really believe is what this measure is all about—it will help mothers help with their rehabilitation and make them as others have said much less likely to be recidivists. 
I really do not think we should be worrying about the financial dimensions of this bill. We are after all talking about only 13 mothers with babies. As a previous speaker—I think it was Judy Turner—said the long-term costs of denying a child breastfeeding and bonding with the mother will be infinitely more expensive than the costs of implementing this measure.