Tolley Anne: Crimes (Substituted Section 59) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Tolley Anne: Crimes (Substituted Section 59) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:638;Page:8464] 
ANNE TOLLEY (National—East Coast) 
: 
 We have heard a great deal of debate already on this bill the Crimes (Substituted Section 59) Amendment Bill. I have heard things from the Government benches like: “We must pass this bill to change attitudes.” “We must pass this bill to draw a line in the sand.” and “This bill is about taking a stand striking a blow.” I say to Government members that they are absolutely right. Up and down this country mums and dads grandmas and grandads aunties uncles and cousins—you name it—are changing their attitudes. They are drawing a line in the sand and that is why we are seeing the energy that the previous speaker Damien O’Connor talked about; they are sick and tired of this Government telling them what to do. They are sick and tired of a nanny State Government reaching into their living rooms and telling them how to look after their children. That is the change in attitude—they have had enough of this Government telling them what to do. If Government members want to change the attitudes of New Zealanders they should keep on doing just what they are doing. 
Up and down the country 84 percent of New Zealanders are rejecting this bill. They know that this bill does not do a jot to address the appalling record of child abuse in this country. This bill does not do a thing. It does absolutely nothing. We have a Government that is paralysed by the appalling figures of child abuse. We have a Minister in charge of Child Youth and Family Ruth Dyson who is more interested in spin than in substance. She is far quicker to appoint public relations people up and down the country to spin out what a great job she is doing than she is to appoint highly qualified professional people at the front line to do the job that needs doing in this country. I say to Ruth Dyson that this bill will not do it. If we are serious about attacking child abuse in this country this bill will not do a thing. 
I sat on the Justice and Electoral Committee and listened when people from organisations like Barnardos and Plunket made their presentations. Those people are working at the front line of child abuse in this country. Of course they want the Government to do something. They are asking this Government to do anything because it is frozen. The Government and the Minister have no idea of what to do to address child abuse. The Government will pass a bill like this it will do a television campaign and tell people not to hit their children and it thinks it will all go away. The Government is bereft of ideas and it is time it went. 
I have absolute sympathy for the desire to get rid of the defence currently in the law in section 59. I brought to my caucus pictures of a child who had been beaten with a wooden stick by his father. They were horrific. That father used section 59 as a defence. I want to speak in support of the amendment in the name of my colleague Chester Borrows because his amendment addresses what is wrong with section 59. Chester Borrows’ amendment takes away the defence used in a number of pretty horrific cases and I think it deserves the support of this Committee because it protects the hundreds of thousands of good Kiwi parents who know the difference between smacking their child and bashing their child. 
 We have heard a lot of rhetoric in this Committee but there is a huge difference between giving a child a smack and bashing a child. No one in this Committee supports bashing and thrashing children—no one in this Committee does. But if we are serious about doing something about our appalling statistics of child abuse then we must recognise that passing a law that the people who commit that violence do not even know about let alone understand will make no difference in their lives. 
Child Youth and Family workers themselves talk about some of the common factors they see in families where child abuse takes place. They talk about things like poverty poor housing indebtedness neglect and that cycle of violence where smashing people is a norm—smashing people not a tap on the bottom saying “Do not do that again.” or a smack on the hand saying “Don’t do that again you’ll burn yourself.” That is the difference. People on this side of the Committee who are supporting Chester Borrows’ amendment understand that New Zealand parents in the main are good parents.