NZ HERALD 5:00AM Friday Jan 25, 2008

NZ HERALD 5:00AM Friday Jan 25, 2008

The council says it is concerned the policy will take the state further into private family matters. “We may be encouraging a climate of fear where the state is looking into the private realm to find problems where there are none,” said its chairman, Michael Bott. This observation reflects not so much reasoned consideration of a particular policy as an aping of the sentiment that Government social policy, as illustrated most recently by the anti-smacking legislation, has become too intrusive. It is not an idea of much value, given incidents such as 12-year-old Bailey Junior Kurariki’s involvement in the violent death of an Auckland pizza deliverer.