It is a sunny Wellington spring day; I walked past crocuses and the beginning of daffodils to get my ballot paper, and past trees starting to show their spring growth to post it.

I voted yes because I believe smacking children is wrong.

I voted yes because I want to reaffirm that the Christian right do not speak for me. Many many (many) Christians in New Zealand believe, as I do, that smacking is wrong.

I voted yes because countless people gained the signatures of 300,000 voters to give me the opportunity to say out loud what I believe.

I voted yes because I want to live in a country where children are hugged, held, comforted, and raised to be non-violent adults.

I voted yes because I love.

The question being asked in this year’s referendum is “Should a smack as part of good parental correction be a criminal offence in New Zealand?”

This question is deliberately phrased to lead one to vote no because of the phrase “as part of good parental correction.” However most studies have shown that a smack cannot be part of good parental correction because it does not work and in many cases can lead to child abuse.

Some people have got the idea into their heads that by not voting people will listen to them. This is absurd and anybody who supports protecting children from assault should be voting YES in this referendum.

A YES VOTE supports the equal rights of children to be protected from assault under law.
A YES VOTE supports a law which was passed with the support of 113 MPs out of 121.
A YES VOTE is supported by Plunket, Barnardos, Unicef, Save the Children, Women’s Refuge, Epoch New Zealand and over 70 other NGOs.

Some have said that the current law has criminalised good parents who smack their children. However reality gets in the way of this argument since no parent has been prosecuted for smacking a child. This is because police have the power to exercise discretion in cases where prosecution is not in the public interest.

It should be a criminal offence to smack a child because any attempt to define an acceptable level of violence against a child leaves the law open to abuse, as occurred when “reasonable force” was still a legal defence in a case of child abuse.

Finally some have said that it is necessary to use force to prevent a child from being harmed. However the current law provides for the use of reasonable force to prevent a child being harmed, harming others or harming property.

I’m VOTING YES
for the equal rights of New Zealand children to be protected from assault.

For more info check out www.youtube.com/headlessrd
or http://yesvote.org.nz

James Barber

• This is Sheryl Savill’s petition not Larry Baldock’s. Savill, a staff member at Focus on the Family’s New Zealand organisation put this forward before Baldock jumped on the referendum bandwagon.
• MPs from a other parties, including National (Bob Simcock) and NZ First (Brian Donnelly and Barbara Stewart), had placed bills to either repeal or amend s59 in the ballot in the past, they were just less lucky than Sue Bradford.
• The bill received support from both sides of the house throughout the debate.
• The bill was eventually passed 113 to 8 – it was supported by a massive majority of MPs
• The actual text of the new s59 can be found here – it does not actually ban smacking

Secondly, in case any of you are interested in a much more wordy context I have attached, below the fold, a slightly updated piece I wrote for a different purpose earlier this year. It was written to follow on from a summary of the international context, if anyone’s really keen I can post that too :)

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