Sensible move to track abusive mothers

The change of direction by this government is no better illustrated than by the move announced today to keep track of abusive mothers who have either had their children taken into care – or worse. This seems so sensible that one wonders why it is not already happening.

But then we have had nine years of a Labour government which believed that no-one should be “tainted” by their criminal offending, and offenders of all kinds should have endless “second chances”.

The example quoted in the Herald today epitomising the failure of the present system is Lisa Kuka, the mother of Nia Glassie. Kuka had had a child removed from her care in the past, but because there was no tracking of Kuka, she was able to give birth to and neglect Nia without the authorities being aware of Nia’s existence or what was happening in her short tragic life.

This will now change, thereby as a side effect removing the need for officials to literally stand by the bed as Chris Kahui’s new partner gave birth to another child fathered by him. The sad reality is that the mother of the dead twins – still in her thirties – has the ability to have perhaps eight more children. I believe she has already had six, two of whom are dead and the others removed into care.

No doubt some fools will say that this should not mean her “rights” to have more children should be constrained. I say that one abused child should move the onus onto the parents of that child to show that they are fit to have the care of more children, and allow the authorities to determine whether they can.

This is an easy statement to make, but the implementation of what lies behind it opens a Pandora’s Box of difficult questions. It has become a well worn cliche that one needs a licence to own a dog, but not to have children. Should this be the case? If one needs a licence to have children, who should decide whether one is granted? Should it be possible to reach a point where a person – male or female – is made physically unable to reproduce further? If that is ever the case, who would decide?

Those are hugely difficult questions, but in my view that should not prevent us having a discussion about them. The raw reality is that the present system of “interventions” – to use the present jargon – is not working, and children are being abused and killed every day.

It is probably fanciful to look to a return to families and communities of yesteryear when abuse and killing of children was much less frequent. If those families and communities are lost forever, we need to look at other ways of protecting our most vulnerable – no matter how difficult and distasteful they may be.