Brown Peter: Care of Children Bill — Instruction to Committee Procedure In Committee 
Brown Peter: Care of Children Bill — Instruction to Committee Procedure In Committee 
[Volume:621;Page:16659] 
PETER BROWN (Deputy Leader—NZ First) 
: 
 Initially I did not intend to take a call on this bill but I am very pleased to do so. I am particularly pleased to follow the Minister David Benson-Pope because if I was not confused before I am now. My understanding is that Judith Collins’ amendment is about notifying the parents— 
Hon Member 
: That’s very moderate. 
PETER BROWN 
:—that is very moderate—not about stopping an abortion from going ahead. It is about parents being notified. I draw the Minister’s attention—and I would like him to respond to this—to the commentary on the bill. I do not want any confusion so I will read it. It states: “Labour and Green members recommend that clause 37 remain unchanged. It has existed in the Guardianship Act since it was introduced in the Contraception Sterilisation and Abortion Act 1977 as a result of the following recommendation of the Royal Commission on Contraception Sterilisation and Abortion:”. It then states: “That legislation be enacted to provide that the consent of a girl under the age of 20 years shall notwithstanding the advice of her parents or guardian have the same effect as if she were of full age provided that grounds for legal abortion exist” and it goes on. That seems to me to imply that the royal commission recognised that parents had a role in that. 
Judith Collins 
: That’s exactly right. 
PETER BROWN 
: I know I am just a simple sailor but that seems to run it home to me. Every so often a bill comes into this House that touches the personal accord in one’s own being. This bill—unbeknown to me when I walked to the Chamber tonight—has touched mine and no speech more so than that by Gordon Copeland. Some years ago when my children—a son and a daughter—were little they lost their mother. My daughter was not even a teenager; my son was. That would have been the worst period in my life by far. I really do not know what I would have done had my daughter had an affair or whatever—she did not—had an abortion and not told me. It would have broken my heart. When Gordon Copeland spoke about the solo mum and the daughter who said that the real tough bit was that she did not tell her it brought water to my eyes. 
Parents give a lot to their kids. I know I have. I do not claim to be the best. I am very proud of my two kids. I married again; my second wife has her three kids and we have five great adults now. My son is now an airline pilot and my daughter is a manager in an accounting firm in Auckland so I am absolutely proud of them. But had they gone through that and not told me I would have been devastated. I certainly would not have been here today; I do not know whether I would have been on this earth to be honest. I would have felt such a failure that I do not know how I would have coped. It was Gordon Copeland’s little speech that really hit it home to me how I could have been in those circumstances. 
 It is not reasonable or proper to withhold that sort of information from a parent. It is not especially from a caring parent who has a good track record. It is not reasonable or proper to withhold that sort of information from a good parent simply because there are some bad buggers out there. That is not fair. That is not the way we do things. I understand that there are some bad parents and I think that is a problem in itself. To some considerable degree Judith Collins’ Supplementary Order Paper addresses that issue. But we cannot punish the good parents or hold them to ransom because there are some bad ones. That is what I call “community punishment”. We punish everybody because there is a bad guy. That is what the Nazis did in the war. They punished the good guys because they could not find the bad guys. It is the same philosophy.