Listening to radio and watching TV it's easy to gain the impression that NZ fares far worse in terms of certain social problems eg child abuse. But I notice that Australian child abuse statistics are uncannily similar to ours. There were 252,000 child protection notifications in 2004/05 . Multiplying our incidence, 53,097 over the same period, by a factor of 4.9 produces 260,175.
Which then begs the question, why are the rates so similar? Do the rates reflect a true incidence of abuse or the level of paranoia and suspicion created by the abuse industry? The conditions that lead to reporting may be more malleable than the actual rate of abuse.
On a very loosely related topic (babies of teenagers are more likely to be abused or neglected AND I'm too lazy to start a new post) Keisha Castle Hughes is reported to be expecting a baby at 16. Too young in my book.
Still, she's not on her own. Last year 373 16 year-olds gave birth. 61 percent were Maori.
With six hundred and twelve 16 and 17 year-old single mums on a benefit I think we taxpayers can take a legitimate interest.
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What I'd prefer is that we stopped encouraging the perpetuation of violence and/or neglect with a welfare mentality that says, behave how you like - there are no consequences - none of any import to you at least - and the money will still be in your bank account Tuesday. The "abuse prevention network" by and large runs around trying to put out fires that were lit by the welfare system. Not all but most.
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