A Ministry for Children
May 22nd, 2011 at 9:14 am by David FarrarAfter the 2011 Election, a Labour-led Government will have a Minister for children.
It still astounds me that in New Zealand we have a Minister for Race horses; a Minister for the Rugby World Cup; a Minister for Senior Citizens but no Minister for the most vulnerable in our community, our Kids.
Labour will establish a Ministry for Children. Its job will be to make sure children are a priority, not just in theory, but in practice.
If the lack of a Minister for Children amazes Annette, why didn’t she call for one sometime in the last 30 years she has been an MP? How about when she was Minister of Youth Affairs in 1989?
And I agree it is silly we have a Minister for race horses. But I was not a member of the Cabinet which massively increased funding for race horses, against official advice, to placate Winston – whose major secret funders happen to all own race horses.
Heather Roy notes:
“New Zealand already has a small army of Ministers and departments to deal with child welfare; the Ministry of Social Development, the Children’s Commissioner, the Families Commission and the Ministry of Youth Development, and yet too many of our vulnerable children are still subject to terrible abuse and poverty.
I have no doubt that Annette is absolutely sincere in wanting to reduce child abuse and the like. But I am very cynical about the notion that another Ministry is the answer.
Related posts:
- A Ministry for children?
- Southland Times on Ministry for Children
- The White Paper for Vulnerable Children
- The Green Paper for Vulnerable Children
May 22nd, 2011 at 9:56 am
Labour’s universal solution to all problems: more bureaucrats.
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 9:58 am
Yeah poor old possum head is not to impressed, full moon wants to shut him down and he’s not happy. Fuck when will these lefty clowns get it in their heads the people have had ENOUGH OF THIS SHIT. Children’s commission, fuck off full moon you mad social engineering cow. These same aholes reapplied s59 and at the time we were told all would be right in the world, when it came to child abuse, yeah and that has been a roaring fucking success,not. Get out of family business government. This will be just another black hole ministry that will achieve diddle squat.
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 10:00 am
Just run that past me again.
Vote:Did I hear that the woman tasked with babysitting Darren Hughes wants to set up a Childrens’ Commission?
May 22nd, 2011 at 10:03 am
Labour trying to sound new and fresh,
doesnt really wash when the MP is suddenly ‘astounded’ after 30 years.
In terms of the objective, more of the same.. nothing but fundamental changes are needed to go anywhere solving our ‘terrible [child] abuse and poverty’.
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 10:09 am
Labour’s solution to most problems is to create another person to look sad when the same problem occurs because the last solution did sweet FA.
Just like banning smacking stopped children being killed, and microchipping of dogs stopped people being mauled.
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 10:23 am
From the NZ Herald article: Labour will dis-establish the Families Commission in its next term in government and instead set up a Ministry for Children, with a senior “minister for children” sitting at the Cabinet table….She said Labour would pay for the new initiative from the current budget for the Families Commission of $7.7 million a year
Does this comment signify that Labour are ruling out United Future/Peter Dunne as one of their coalition partners in 2011? I am sure Mr Quiff won’t be happy…
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 10:29 am
I think when we look at child abuse we should go into preventative mode, just like in any battle, disease or crisis, who are popping out those kids and should they have to meet some basic regulations to allow it…that is the making and the popping out.
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 10:29 am
Actually, I believe Dunne has already ruled out working with Labour.
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 10:30 am
I’m actually surprised that King hasn’t suggested that Haussman head up a ministry to employ her husband.
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 10:43 am
BB
“I think when we look at child abuse we should go into preventative mode, just like in any battle, disease or crisis, who are popping out those kids and should they have to meet some basic regulations to allow it…that is the making and the popping out.”
Made me think about the woman on “Campbell Live” a few nights ago who complained she did not have enough money to feed her kids and was interviewed at the foodbank.
Vote:1. She had five kids..When did it become obvious to her that she couldn’t afford more kids? After the first, the second, the third , the fourth or the fifth one?
2. Here she was, a (morbidly?) obese women complaining about the lack of food….
3. She felt sorry for her husband who worked very hard and was soooooo tired when he came back from work. Obviously not tired enough for some R&R at night. Wait for number 6.
It is their right to produce children, as many as they like and it is someone else’s duty to pay for them
And we need a license when we want to drive a car…
May 22nd, 2011 at 10:47 am
Other_Andy
It’s socialism – they are entitled to other peoples money….
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 10:50 am
Next announcement from Labour – a new Minister for Left Handed People.
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 10:53 am
I for one would be opposing Petra and Kerrie’s applications.
Who knows what horrors they may produce?
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 10:54 am
Was this poor woman King under the influence of a full moon when she made this pathetic promise?
The socialists have lost the plot and are never short of ways of wasting other people’s money.
She’ll be better advised to keep an eye on her tenants instead.
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 11:09 am
Unfortunately you guys have failed to think about the depths of this issue and how it will enhance the development of children. All of you know that I hate the extension of ministries like a hole in the head but we could reduce about 10 or fifteen and make one in its place with better objectives.
Kids need nurturing from birth to high school. At the moment its spread all round the place, the noisy get the cake and the rest forgotten.
Take for example foster kids. The work foster families do for these kids is truly humbling. They take trashed kids and help to recover them and put them back together again so that they don’t become statistics of crime or jail.
Do these people get proper support and recognition. Hell no. Are these kids going to stop being, again no.
We spend more money in schools doing for special needs kids who in most cases have only a life expectancy with constant supervision and very little productive future. Should we abandon them, No I don’t think so but we do little for the kids who are really going to excel in science and maths etc by comparison. Unfortunately these are the kids who as future adults will pay the taxes to assist those that can’t help themselves.
We need to spend more education resources on those that will create, discover and build for the future. Many schools try but are hampered by funding issues etc.
There are so many reasons to advocate for our kids and that doesn’t mean political stuff like anti smacking and so on which was only bought about by the perpetrators of exactly those actions appeasing their own guilt. Not required by normal people. Advocating for kids may well be the way to remove the old structures in the Education system and that could not be bad.
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 11:18 am
how about a Minister for Slumlords? they cop shit and need protecting.
Minister of Hookers?
If Hughes was still around they could have Minister of Rentboys
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 11:25 am
DimPost has redeemed itself somewhat after a couple of weeks of inane Labour cheerleading.
http://dimpost.wordpress.com/2011/05/22/labour-mistakes-the-map-for-the-territory/
Some actual analysis that makes sense.
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 11:39 am
Even after decades of exposure to politicians should have made me more cynical I reluctantly have to agree with you that she’s sincere.
But so what. The key point is that another government minister and ministry is the only answer the Left have to any societal problem.
It would be nice to think that some of the wilder outliers of the left (meaning the anarchists) might somehow conjure up at least some ideas about crafting some government “incentives” that allow people to solve their own problems over time. I’ve thought for a while that this is where at least some members of the various Maori movements are heading – and being allowed to by Government. Certainly the Turia’s and the Sharple’s have little or no faith in the ability of government to rescue their people, even as they continue to agitate for government support in numerous areas. But at least they seem to be moving in the right direction, which is why it should not have been a surprise to the Left that they teamed up with National.
But for the traditional Left there is no other answer. This is not as simple as a desire to add more bureaucracy; it’s the logical outcome of having evermore rules and regulations, and when those fail, to add further rules and regulations. If the rulebook has failed, then the answer is to make the rulebook twice as thick: that’ll fix things. The people required to monitor and enforce all this just come with the territory.
But I hold much of the right-wing responsible for this as well, for failing to intellectually fight back against this crap, for just going with the flow because that’s easier than standing up to some left-wing prick playing the usual guilt-gotcha game.
I’ve reached the conclusion that the only thing that’s going to put a stop to this insanity is a lack of money. Fortunately that no longer even requires tax revolts; the systems built by the left the world over are black holes that are growing faster than the economies that feed them. But these people are not going to listen. They’re too busy emoting, at least up to the point where they win power, appoint another commissar and retreat to the problem-solved dinner party.
So feed them more: indulge the left with their own stupidities. Engorge the beasts and watch them die. Sure, it’ll be shitty for all of us, for all of society, but there seems no other alternative.
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 11:49 am
I agree it seems strange, but not as strange as your coverage of the issue DPF. Other than dog-whistling, why else would you ignore the fact that she also spoke about how the families commission and some other agencies will be dis-established and merged into this new ministry which will have a singular focus (and supposedly the teeth it needs) to improve conditions for our young people?
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 11:53 am
One of the best ways to prevent any problems being solved is to task multiple agencies with the same basic problem, give them overlapping areas of responsibilities and power then stand back and watch the gridlock.
Adding a children’s ministry will be exactly this. There are already too many agencies involved in this problem. The solution (if any in fact exists that the govt can control) is not to add more agencies, but to remove them.
When I first heard the report I thought they would be staffing this ministry with children. But that also would be a bad idea as it would likely come up with more good ideas than the real grown up labour ministries.
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 1:44 pm
The point of all this is to provide careers for socialists with degrees in ‘dike studies, and ‘psyc 101′. I mean, you wouldn’t want them lying on the couch all day, eating bon bons, and watching Oprah would you?
cheers
David Prosser
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 1:50 pm
Still no suggestion of a Ministry for Men’s Affairs I see. I wonder why?
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 3:08 pm
All the ministries KING mentions should be abolished as should the ridiculous Families Commission but it does not need to be replaced by a Children’s Minister. All that need happen is for authority and accountability to be handed back to parents, teachers, and police.
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 4:09 pm
If Labour had their way we’d have a minister for proper toilet etiquet.
Vote:May 22nd, 2011 at 6:48 pm
How about a minister for “mind your own damned business”. Children are not the responsibility of the state, they are the responsibility of the parents.
The state has no business in my kids, especially the bloody Labour party.
Labour would be better advocating for a minister of “Gay affairs” because their ‘gays’ don’t seem to have their affairs in order!
Vote:May 23rd, 2011 at 9:51 am
There is perhaps another aspect to this, which is not so silly -’Control’.
As we know. the Socialsits’ (‘Labour’ in New Zealand) are control freaks, and are also dedicated, idealogically, to the destruction of the Family.
In that context, it makes perfectly good logic to the socialist mind, to create a ‘Children’s Commission’ and use it to exercise ever increasing control over the new generation under the guise of ‘protecting’ the helpless.
I cannot remember which Roman Catholic ‘high-up’ made the observation about ‘giving us a child before he is seven and we have him forever’ (or words to that effect), but this new proposed ‘safeguard’ is very much in the same vein and is nio different to the child-indoctrination practices pervalent in Communist Bloc countries or China. it’s all to do with ‘indoctrination’ and control, and absolutely NOTHING to do with genuine welfare. Taht they should didtch the ‘Families Commission’ with such alaacrity is also revealing and proof that, if you can’t get control one way, then there are certainly others.
BTW – is Annette King a parent?
Vote:May 24th, 2011 at 1:44 pm
Apart from taking money off their parents in the budget what is the government doing for NZ’s kids?
Vote:May 24th, 2011 at 2:13 pm
Maggie – another kite flying exercise, I see. How I wish you socialists could be original.
I thought your main worry would be whether Labour was including in their election year bribes the suggestion that the dole would be extended to include Kangaroo Point, Brisbane.
Vote: