Smith Murray: Care of Children Bill — Second Reading 
Smith Murray: Care of Children Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:621;Page:16428] 
MURRAY SMITH (United Future) 
: 
 It is interesting that as we debate the second reading of the Care of Children Bill we find that the Government and the Green Party can find no fault with the bill and that the Opposition parties of ACT National and New Zealand First can find very little good with it. United Future as the centre party finds itself in somewhat of a dilemma because we find that there is a great deal about the bill that is positive but there are also considerable weaknesses. As the party that represents the family we see that there are medium and long term dangers in this bill that will undermine family life in New Zealand and further erode the position of parents in particular. 
But there are a lot of positive things about the bill and we believe that the environment it creates will provide short-term benefits in terms of family resilience—in particular in the area of disputes which are all too common in regard to family life. In particular we are very pleased to see the statements in clause 4A “Principles relevant to child’s welfare and best interests”. That clause follows the general statement in the bill that the child’s welfare and best interests are to be paramount. We agree that when we are dealing with situations of conflict it is important for our society that the primary focus is the children and what is in their welfare and best interests as opposed to the parents who are in a state of disagreement. That is the right approach. 
The principles that are enunciated have some very good things about them. The first principle is that the child’s parents and guardians should have the primary responsibility and should be encouraged to agree to make their own arrangements for the child’s care development and upbringing. That is a worthy principle. It puts the obligation for the child’s upbringing and responsibility firmly with the parents rather than with the State rather than with medical and other professionals and rather than with people outside that environment. It is important that the role of parents is reinforced that parents are told by society that they have a valuable role and that the Government will uphold their role as the primary instruments in the upbringing of their children. Simply put the State cannot do the job. It cannot do the job because it cannot afford to do the job; it cannot do the job because it lacks the love and compassion and the sacrificial time and finances that parents give to their children in order to raise them in the best way that they can. 
The second principle enunciated is that there should be continuity in arrangements for the child’s care development and upbringing and that the child’s relationships with his or her family family group whanau hapu or iwi should be stable and ongoing. That also is something that society should be commending and that the Government should be encouraging so that we have a situation of family resilience where we have parents who are being encouraged to stay together to bring up their children where the stability of family life is the prime focus of the Government and where the Government takes steps to ensure that children are put into environments that will be stable long-lasting and the best environments for raising our children. Sadly that is not happening. 
The third principle that the Government has agreed to adopt is that the child’s care development and upbringing should be facilitated by ongoing consultation and cooperation among and between the child’s parents and guardians and all persons exercising the role of providing day-to-day care for or are entitled to have contact with the child. This is a principle that United Future in particular pushed right from the outset of this bill before it even got to the select committee and that the Government agreed to support. It is the one that states that it is in children’s best interests that they should be brought up by both their parents—a mother and a father—and that those parents should be working together in a consultative and cooperative way in order to bring up the children. Unfortunately from my experience that is a matter that particularly in terms of the District Court has not always been the case. We have been through cycles in which courts have decided in 90 percent of cases that it is in the best interests of the children for them to be put with their mother and for the father to be excluded from their life. That is an unhealthy and unwelcome position. It is important as this bill states that children have access to both their mother and their father and as much access as possible and that we encourage mothers and fathers to cooperate and consult each other. 
The fourth principle that I want to allude to is that the relationships between the child and members of his or her family family group whanau hapu or iwi should be preserved and strengthened and that those members should be encouraged to participate in the child’s care development and upbringing. That is important again with the role of fathers in our society. One of the tragedies of our society is that we have too many absent fathers. Boys are not encouraged into fatherhood and are not encouraged to play their full role as parents as they ought to be. In terms of the culture that has previously been operating in our Family Court we have found that the court has tended to say: “Well let those fathers go. We don’t really need them. We’ll let the mother do all the caring.” That has been disastrous. The one thing perhaps that children in our society are missing more than anything else is regular ongoing contact with fathers and we need to encourage fathers to provide that role. That role has been grossly underestimated. As a society we need to educate our fathers and convince them that they have an important role in their child’s life and that they should hang in there stick in there and provide that role. 
Another aspect of the bill that I think is of value is the new emphasis on children indicating their views to the court and on the court hearing them. Although I think that at times the rights of children can be taken too far where they go beyond and supersede the rights of parents—as I have previously said parents have the important role in terms of the bringing up of children and the nurturing of them—I think this bill is good in terms of its encouragement for children to be able to express their views in court proceedings in a direct way either to the court or to the lawyer who is acting for the children so that their views are taken into account. To that extent I do agree with the Gillick principle that as a child gets older the amount of notice taken of his or her view should be increased. 
However the thing that I really do not like about the bill and find overwhelming is the whole ideological bent that effectively subsumes the welfare and best interests of the child to other factors. As far as this Government is concerned the interests of the child are OK as long as they do not infringe on the interests of partners of lesbian mothers on the role of medical and other professionals where it conflicts with the parents’ rights and on the rights and interests of women in particular solo women to be able to have children. The Government ignores the welfare and best interests of the child—despite the bill’s very fine principles—when it comes to those three areas. It is this ideological bent which undermines the best interests of the child that I think will cause many aspects of this bill to create bad families and actually enhance the breakdown of families. 
The whole drive in this bill from biological parents to social parents is a quagmire. It is something that will cause huge amounts of problems. Parents are biological parents—the natural mother and the natural father. As soon as we start denying that and trying to invent social constructs of parenthood such as lesbian mothers’ partners we get ourselves into all sorts of difficulties. I have no problem with a husband and wife either legal or de facto who agree to an assisted human reproduction procedure in order to construct a family being known as the mother and the father. But I have a lot of difficulty with partners of lesbian mothers suddenly taking on fatherhood roles—guardianship yes that is fine. 
So there are many aspects of this bill that we think are actually undermining of the family and United Future will not support it because of those pervading aspects.