Turner Judy: Care of Children Bill — First Reading 
Turner Judy: Care of Children Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:609;Page:6671] 
JUDY TURNER (United Future) 
: 
 United Future members would usually support the first reading of a bill with the intention of using the process of the select committee to deliberate on any concerning clauses and any submissions in greater detail. We would reserve the right to re-evaluate our position after the select committee had presented a report. However we have some fundamental concerns about this bill which means that United Future will not be supporting it. 
This bill proposes changes to outdated and loaded terminology such as “custody” and “access” replacing it with new terms like “parenting orders” that should lend themselves to a more preferred equal-parenting approach to the care of children. However United Future believes that this bill stops short of delivering to children more equitable parenting arrangements and instead just upholds the old provisions with new less emotive language such as the terms “day-to-day care” instead of “custody” and “contact” instead of “access”. The old winner-loser outcomes still exist but under a new guise. Not enough effective change has been made to enable both parents to have an equitable chance of being involved in the raising of their children. 
United Future would prefer a bill that provides clear guidelines regarding the use of the Family Court and family lawyers with an emphasis on an assumed cooperation between the parents and on an assumed equity between both parents. This approach differs slightly from Ms Newman’s shared-parenting approach which had a more enforced approach to equal parenting. We believe that forcing an unwilling parent to be involved in his or her child’s life is unlikely to be in the best interests of the child. However if both parents want to have significant contact with their children and where both parents are safe caregivers then United Future believes that it is in the child’s best interest that guardianship laws facilitate an arrangement that reflects the value to the child of having both parents playing a constant part in the child’s life. Arrangements should be made that are appropriate to the age and needs of each child. Those arrangements need to be flexible changing as the needs of the child change. 
The essence of this bill is guardianship and although we agree that an overhaul is needed to update legislation that deals with the care of children we have grave misgivings about what has been proposed in this bill. The Minister believes that the Family Court will screen inappropriate applications for guardianship but United Future believes that clear guidelines are needed to facilitate this vital decision-making process. As things stand step-parents have to demonstrate a greater long-term commitment to a relationship to legally get their hands on half the furniture than they do to gain guardianship over the children in the relationship. 
We believe that time frames must be included in this bill to ensure that a certain amount of time or commitment has been shown before a person is appointed as a child’s guardian. If an additional guardian is to be appointed then it is surely in a child’s best interests that some sense of longevity and stability be established—at least as long as is required for property rights. 
For United Future the issue surrounding the care of children is bigger than just the guardianship issue covered by the bill. A single piece of legislation never exists in isolation from the tapestry of law that undergirds life in Aotearoa New Zealand. United Future believes it is vital that a child’s identity is clearly protected. The bottom line is a matter of pure biology—that is every child has a mother and a father. 
United Future has already demonstrated that with the broad definition of “family”—which has been included in the Families Commission—we accept the diversity of relationships that surround the care of children. However we advocate that where possible every child should have access to both its mother and its father regardless of whatever care arrangements exist. With the onslaught of new birth technology and advances in medical research heritage is at risk of being overlooked neglected and even rejected. The arrangement made for the care of children should never override the long-term best interests of the child which surely include preserving the vital link to his or her parentage. Confusing the terms “mother” and “father” and in particular the feminine and masculine aspects of those basic family relationships is ill conceived. Care arrangements that deliberately withhold information or neglect opportunities for safe contact with the natural biological parent do not reflect a child-focused approach. This concern is not about judging people’s ability to be caring guardians but it is a concern about obscuring a child’s chance to have contact with a mother or a father because it does not suit the living arrangements of the adults in the family. This is not a child-focused approach. 
The bill does differentiate between natural guardians—the biological parents—and appointed guardians. That is fine but then in an apparent contradiction it allows for a non-biological adult living with the mother during any stage of the pregnancy to be given guardianship rights that are equal to that of the biological mother. United Future will not support this bill because our concern is not that additional guardians can and should be appointed but that in certain circumstances this can be done to the deliberate exclusion of biological parents.