Yesterday, the Prime Minister was talking up NZ's poor record of keeping its children safe.
She said, in respect of Bradford's Bill, The Government has taken a position because of its great concern about being bottom in the developed world in relation to the rate of death and injury of children in our homes. We are absolutely delighted that Parliament has been almost unanimous in taking a stand on these issues. We believe that that will be good for children and families of our country.
She refers, in part at least, to the Innocenti Report Card below which shows deaths due to maltreatment.
The New Zealand statistic was based on the average number of deaths from 1994 - 98. In the five years to 2003 it dropped to 0.9 but let's ignore that we managed that drop without banning smacking.
Look at the top four countries; Spain, Greece, Italy and Ireland. When the statistics were collected none had bans on physical punishment in the home. If the Prime Minister is going to use comparisons to other countries as the basis for her edicts she should familiarise herself with the facts.
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