From this mornings Dominion Post
Six months on from the introduction of the new smacking laws, however, those working at the coalface say fears that sparked the backlash have proved unfounded.
Police are due to release a major review of the change within weeks, but family law and child welfare experts say there has been no noticeable change to the way child violence is being reported.
There have been just two media reports of possible cases of parents being reported for smacking, with no action taken, while Child, Youth and Family reports there has been no significant rise in child abuse notifications since the law change.
Children's Commissioner Cindy Kiro said there had been a campaign run by Christian fundamentalist groups which ordinary parents had become caught up in.
"Their [aim] is to run a bigger political agenda and I think they need to be honest about that. I think they used this as a tactic to position a bigger political debate."
Since the change "the sky hasn't fallen in, parents haven't been charged in overwhelming numbers and children haven't been ripped from their families because they received a smack on the hand".
Has flinging "Christian fundamentalist" about with gay abandon has become a "tactic" to silence criticism of a "bigger political agenda"? As a gedankenexperiment try replacing the phrase Christian fundamentalist with Jewish. It makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up, when I do it.
In any case the quote comes at the end of a story reporting on a Fairfax Media-Nielsen poll asking respondents if they thought the Government had too much control over theirs lives.
No surprise - 57% think they do.
The other 43% either haven't woken up yet or are content to sit quietly on the mat with their arms folded for the rest of their lives.
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