- Parents Are The Best Protection
- By Nicola Roxon
- The Herald Sun
- 29/05/2003 Make a Comment
- Contributed by: admin ( 75 articles in 2003 )
THIS week Labor's Nicola Roxon used these pages [Herald Sun-26may03] to call for a new children's rights body.
And she went on to outline a Bill she has introduced into Parliament calling for the establishment of an Australian Commission for Children and Young People.
The commission would deal with issues such as child abuse, child poverty and other worthy objectives.
However, we believe she is approaching these serious problems in the wrong way. The truth is, children's interests are best served in the context of their own family.
The safest and best place for a child, generally speaking, is with both biological parents. The social science research on this is quite clear.
No bureaucrat, no matter how well intentioned, will ever come close to showing the love, attention and dedication to a child that a mother or a father does.
In most cases, the biological parents of children are the ones who are willing to make the necessary self-sacrifices and self-denial to put the interests of children first.
To argue that children need an advocate is to overlook the fact that they already have one: their own parents.
Now, we as a society are rightly concerned about child sexual abuse.
Therefore, we should be doing all we can to promote and protect the institutions of marriage and family.
Why? Because research shows that the safest place for a child is with his or her biological parents.
For example, former Human Rights Commissioner Brian Burdekin has reported a 500 to 600 per cent increase in sexual abuse of girls in families where the adult male was not the natural father.
A recent study of Victorian child abuse victims found that 45 per cent lived with single parents.
The report, by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, found that children who lived in natural two-parent families had a relatively low risk of abuse.
Also, the Australian Institute of Criminology notes that infants under the age of 12 months are the population group at highest risk of being murdered, and the most likely killer of a child is his or her non-biological father, "in other words, the mother's new partner''.
Overseas evidence backs up the Australian evidence.
A British study recently found that serious child abuse was lowest in intact married families, but six times higher in step-families, 14 times higher in single mother families, 20 times higher in cohabiting biological families, and 33 times higher in cohabiting non-biological (boyfriend) families.
US data shows that children of divorced or never-married mothers are six to 30 times more likely to suffer abuse than are children raised by married biological parents.
A 1994 US study of 52,000 children found that those who were most at risk of being abused were those not living with both parents.
And a Finnish study of nearly 4000 ninth-grade girls found that "stepfather-daughter incest was about 15 times as common as father-daughter incest''.
As one US family expert summarises: "A child is sexually safer with her father than with any other man, from a stepfather to her mother's boyfriend to guys in the neighborhood. She is also safer with a father than without one. A child in a fatherless home faces a significantly higher risk of sexual abuse.''
Of course there are exceptions to the above evidence, but exceptions do not make the rule.
In the main, children are best served with a loving father and mother, preferably cemented by marriage.
There are abusive biological parents, just as there are three-pack-a-day smokers who live to be a hundred.
BUT we should not base public policy on such exceptions.
So the general rule is this: if we are concerned about the safety and wellbeing of children, then we should do all we can to shore up marriage and family. Support for families must be our highest priority.
Government policy must focus on delivering support to children through their families, not apart from families.
It is a loving family, not a faceless bureaucrat, who can best look after our children.
BILL MEUHLENBURG is national vice president, Australian Family Association
And she went on to outline a Bill she has introduced into Parliament calling for the establishment of an Australian Commission for Children and Young People.
The commission would deal with issues such as child abuse, child poverty and other worthy objectives.
However, we believe she is approaching these serious problems in the wrong way. The truth is, children's interests are best served in the context of their own family.
The safest and best place for a child, generally speaking, is with both biological parents. The social science research on this is quite clear.
No bureaucrat, no matter how well intentioned, will ever come close to showing the love, attention and dedication to a child that a mother or a father does.
In most cases, the biological parents of children are the ones who are willing to make the necessary self-sacrifices and self-denial to put the interests of children first.
To argue that children need an advocate is to overlook the fact that they already have one: their own parents.
Now, we as a society are rightly concerned about child sexual abuse.
Therefore, we should be doing all we can to promote and protect the institutions of marriage and family.
Why? Because research shows that the safest place for a child is with his or her biological parents.
For example, former Human Rights Commissioner Brian Burdekin has reported a 500 to 600 per cent increase in sexual abuse of girls in families where the adult male was not the natural father.
A recent study of Victorian child abuse victims found that 45 per cent lived with single parents.
The report, by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, found that children who lived in natural two-parent families had a relatively low risk of abuse.
Also, the Australian Institute of Criminology notes that infants under the age of 12 months are the population group at highest risk of being murdered, and the most likely killer of a child is his or her non-biological father, "in other words, the mother's new partner''.
Overseas evidence backs up the Australian evidence.
A British study recently found that serious child abuse was lowest in intact married families, but six times higher in step-families, 14 times higher in single mother families, 20 times higher in cohabiting biological families, and 33 times higher in cohabiting non-biological (boyfriend) families.
US data shows that children of divorced or never-married mothers are six to 30 times more likely to suffer abuse than are children raised by married biological parents.
A 1994 US study of 52,000 children found that those who were most at risk of being abused were those not living with both parents.
And a Finnish study of nearly 4000 ninth-grade girls found that "stepfather-daughter incest was about 15 times as common as father-daughter incest''.
As one US family expert summarises: "A child is sexually safer with her father than with any other man, from a stepfather to her mother's boyfriend to guys in the neighborhood. She is also safer with a father than without one. A child in a fatherless home faces a significantly higher risk of sexual abuse.''
Of course there are exceptions to the above evidence, but exceptions do not make the rule.
In the main, children are best served with a loving father and mother, preferably cemented by marriage.
There are abusive biological parents, just as there are three-pack-a-day smokers who live to be a hundred.
BUT we should not base public policy on such exceptions.
So the general rule is this: if we are concerned about the safety and wellbeing of children, then we should do all we can to shore up marriage and family. Support for families must be our highest priority.
Government policy must focus on delivering support to children through their families, not apart from families.
It is a loving family, not a faceless bureaucrat, who can best look after our children.
BILL MEUHLENBURG is national vice president, Australian Family Association
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