Turia Tariana: Corrections (Mothers with Babies) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
Turia Tariana: Corrections (Mothers with Babies) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:647;Page:16165] 
Hon TARIANA TURIA (Co-Leader—Maori Party) 
: 
 Tena koe Mr Assistant Speaker tena tatou. The Maori Party comes to the Corrections (Mothers with Babies) Amendment Bill believing that when we focus on the intersection between mothers and babies in the criminal justice system there should be one essential principle that guides all others—that is the principle of whanaungatanga. Whanau is whakapapa or genealogy; whanau is kotahitanga or about being united; and whanau is manaakitanga or looking after one another. In fact although whanau in Maori means “to give birth” it also means “family”. 
Whanau to be quite frank is more than merely a mum. A child who is born to a whanau belongs to us all. I have personal experience: I was not raised by my mother; I was raised by my grandmother and two aunts. I do not recall that that in any way hindered my development. In fact it gave me greater opportunities possibly than I would have had had I been raised by my own mother. So although we of course support the importance of bonding where that needs to happen we also believe that bonding can take place within the wider whakapapa and that it must not be undermined by a reliance on one birth parent. Again I refer to my own situation. I am raising a mokopuna. She knows her mother and her father but I am her mama. I am the one who does everything for her and she is the light of my life. 
I have to say from the outset that it is sad enough that tamariki get caught up in their mothers’ offending. Those children have committed no crime yet in many ways they are the ones who pay the price. No child should be raised in a prison. It is a volatile and hostile environment—the very antithesis of what we expect our children to grow up in. So I support the korero of Ministers Phil Goff and Steve Chadwick when they say that ideally these children should be raised at home with their mothers serving a home detention. Prison is hardly a safe environment for women let alone babies and young children and it is certainly not the best place in which to support the mental emotional and physical development of a child. But some women will offend and some women will end up in prison giving birth and having to take their tamariki into that environment. So we acknowledge Sue Bradford for thinking of those women and children. The Maori Party recognises that there may be some women who do not have family to call on yet seek to maintain contact with their children while they are incarcerated. Those women need all the support available to guide them in such a vital role. The well-being of our children depends on support and education being readily available and on hand to ensure that their needs are met. 
Let me again return to the notion of whanaungatanga. This is the collective investment in the generations the genealogical commitment to the well-being of the whanau hapu and iwi. This should be uppermost in our consideration of how best to provide for children under the age of 24 months. Children should be able to benefit from the unique bonding caring and nurturing of their mother and also their father whatever setting they are in. But the question I would ask is whether it has to be in a prison. Every newborn baby provides every whanau with a new opportunity to protect and respect the cultural heritage that he or she has emerged into. The sad thing for me is that too many of our parents become parents without ever having had the privilege of receiving the kind of support and the kind of parenting that enables them to be the very best parent possible for their child. The Maori Party welcomes the opportunity in this bill to give practical support to positive parenting. We were interested that the Law and Order Committee gave emphasis to the facilities the accommodation the treatment of inmates and the institutional context in which these mothers with babies are found but surely the key priority is in thinking about how to promote the value of being an effective parent. 
There is also another critical component of this situation—that is our children will not be our children forever. They will eventually become other people’s husbands and wives the parents of our grandchildren and the grandparents of our mokopuna tuarua. So it is important that we get it right for their sakes. The absolute irony in all of this is that we are discussing the beauty of having children child rearing and childcare within the context of incarceration. We know that Maori women are disproportionately represented in the penal system and it stands to reason then that Maori babies will be overrepresented and therefore more likely to benefit from the provisions of this bill. We were pleased to see some flexibility added in as a result of the select committee deliberation. Mothers who are not breastfeeding are included in the provisions of the bill. Caregivers who may not be the children’s biological mothers are also able to apply for eligibility on this programme. 
This bill focuses on the best interests of the child and certainly that is what the Maori Party would expect. In a Maori world view the best interests of the child include nurturing and promoting connections within his or her wider whanau. We wonder whether the parenting agreements although currently fixed on the circumstances of the individual could be expanded to include the wider whanau and hapu responsibility not just for the child but for the mother as well. We noted the advice from the Law and Order Committee that the agreements be limited in effect only as far as our vision determines. If the list of obligatory conditions is truly to serve as a starting point we would expect whanau responsibility and obligation to be inserted into that template. So in the segments of the proposed parenting agreement where “the mother” or the “alternative caregiver” is referred to we would be very keen to see a broader approach taken here also to transform the parenting agreement into a whanau arrangement. 
We note the importance of international evidence to this debate. In New York there is a correctional facility for women that enables newborns to stay with their mother until the age of 2. At 2 years of age the child is then transferred to his or her extended family or the State system where the child can continue to visit his or her mum. The research concludes that this process is far healthier than taking away the baby at say 6 months of age. Some sceptics may say that babies will remember they were born behind prison walls and that they will never be able to get over the limitations of that early start. This bill gives us all an opportunity for another view—to believe that these babies may know that they were nurtured breastfed held and loved by the person who brought them into the world. What this bill does not deal with and what we must attend to is the impacts of life after incarceration for children. In the state of Oregon three centres have opened called the Centre for Family Success. The centres deal with parents who have been incarcerated and provide services such as parenting employment mentoring and counselling. The centres have also started parenting classes in both male and female prisons. These classes have been so successful that the waiting lists are apparently legendary. 
We must do all we can to ensure that the children of the incarcerated become the children of family success. Although the State can do so much our greatest opportunity is to commit to family decision-making and to family success as our most important role. This bill values the significant relationship between mother and child and gives honour to the unique foundation such a relationship provides for every whanau and their future. We will be supporting this bill but we do so with some reservations. Our key priority is supporting children to be raised in loving whanau. We simply do not accept that a prison no matter how much effort is made to humanise it will ever be an appropriate environment for a child. We believe that all circumstances should be traversed. Kia ora.