New Zealand Conservative

An important quote by Pope Francis: "Families are the home Church where Jesus grows. He grows in the spouses' love and in the children's lives. For this reason, the enemy attacks the family so much. The devil does not want it. He tries to destroy it, to prevent love from becoming free. Families are the home church. But married people are sinners like everyone else, they do not want to go in faith, in its fertility, in children and the faith of their children. May the Lord bless the family, and make it strong in the face of the crisis by which the devil wants to destroy it." When I think of the laws passed in recent years in New Zealand that don't strengthen the family here, but instead chip away at undermining it, I can see the influence of the devil on our politicians. Recently, it was the redefinition of marriage, which destroyed the understanding of marriage by the state; and then previously, the anti-smacking law which allowed interference in the family by...

  Just listening to John Key on NewsTalkZB, and the thing that stood out was that John Key wanted to let people know that National could work with the Conservatives. The interviewer was much more interested in talking about the change to potentially being able to work with Winston Peters and New Zealand First, than anything else. Colin Craig has said that the "smacking law" would be one of the things that would influence negotiations were he and his party ever in a position where their support was necessary for a government to form. This article from Stuff calls it a bottom line, and then says the opposite when it quotes what Craig has said about it, leading me to believe that overturning the law will not end up being a condition of support, it will be just used as a means to garner votes.  Probably why John Key is indicating now he can work with the Conservatives. Craig said he was not calling it a bottom-line at this stage because the election had not yet happene...

Image from The Financial Review Good on Tony Abbott!!! A ban on parents smacking their children risks turning Australia into a nanny state , says Prime Minister Tony Abbott, who admits he smacked his own kids. A UN Committee on the Rights of the Child report asks Australia to abolish the right of parents to use reasonable chastisement to discipline children, News Corp Australia reports. The committee would also like teachers and childcare workers to report cases of parents smacking their children . But the idea has not grabbed Mr Abbott. "I was probably one of those guilty parents who did occasionally chastise the children, a very gentle smack I've got to say," Mr Abbott told the Seven Network on Thursday. "I think that we've got to treat our kids well, but I don't think we ought to say there's no place ever for smacks. "All parents know that occasionally the best thing we can give is a smack, but it should never be something that...

There was a very disturbing story in the Dominion Post earlier this week that I noticed elicited very little comment online and on talk-back radio this week, even though it was mentioned on talk-back at least. That was the story of a young woman being banned from and childcare centre for "inappropriately restraining a child" . Her crime? She stopped a child from hitting another child, and this lead to her being banned from the centre. A woman has been banned from a Wellington childcare centre after a Ministry of Education staff member saw her "inappropriately restraining" a child . Even though the woman, in her 20s, was neither a parent nor a staff member at Miramar's A'oga Amata Childcare Centre, the ministry is continuing to monitor the Samoan community centre. A ministry spokeswoman said a staff member saw someone "inappropriately restraining" a child during a visit to the centre on April 23. The child was not hit or hurt, but the minis...

No wonder Family First's promotion of the traditional family is not considered by the New Zealand Government to be in the public interest. We are operating in a very leftist milieu here, and it affects how many individuals and therefore government departments view the world, and family, in a leftist mindset is just not that important. Only problem is this mindset is incredibly socially destructive, which then affects the economy and the safety of citizens, and yet rather than allowing an alternative point of view to try and make it's way here, it's firmly stomped on. Here's Melanie Phillips, writing of her realisation that the Left hates families and actively seeks to destroy them .  She started out being a Leftist herself, thinking that it was the correct side to be on: As a university-educated young woman with hippie-style hair and an attitude, I, too, generally toed the standard Leftist line in the late Seventies and early Eighties. Poverty was bad, cuts ...

Yesterday David Farrar wrote a post condemning Labour for their asset sales referendum when they were not interested in the the results of the anti-smacking referendum that was driven entirely by the people and not by parliamentarians and their staff and their government money. Oh the irony. There can be no doubt that the majority of New Zealanders want correctional smacking to be legal, and there was a referendum that said so by a massive 7:1 margin. Now one can have the view that a party’s policy should triumph over a non binding referendum. I certainly hold that view. But what is absolute hypocrisy is to be a party that ignored the results of this 2009 referendum , and then two years later to then demand that the Government should break its election policy on the basis of the asset sales referendum. What many do not know is that a bill was selected for first reading in Parliament in 2010, just a couple of weeks after the referendum result. The bill would have implemented ...

Good on Family First for continuing to keep this issue in the media. The anti-smacking law is a travesty of social engineering that allows the Government to unjustly interfere in families where there is no actual child abuse, and therefore reduces the autonomy of good families from the State. It's not just about smacking, which is why the Government doesn't want to change the law despite most of New Zealand being against it. Three out of four people back a law change to allow "correctional" smacking of children , a poll has found. But a child advocacy group says correctional smacking remains unacceptable. The poll of 1000 randomly selected people was undertaken by Curia Market Research for advocacy group Family First. Respondents were asked whether the anti-smacking law should be changed to state that "parents who give their children a smack that is reasonable and for the purpose of correction are not breaking the law". Of those asked, 77 per cent ...

Thrilling news today for the unemployment figures. The Labour Dept can reduce the unemployed totals by 10,000 if the Sunday Star Times story can be believed. 10,000 people in NZ are apparently on the run from the law. These people are wanted by police for murder, sexual assault, robbery, and, generally, failure to show up in court. But the good news is that being on the run, they presumably aren't working because then it wouold be easy to track them down. So thrilling news for the unemployment figures, which should exclude criminals from the totals, just as they exclude people in prison and others not in productive employment (such as politicians?). The story that caught my eye this week though is far more significant. A judge thinks premeditated action is worse than an anger response as he criminalizes a mother for asking her husband to smack their child after several other non-physical disciplinary techniques had failed. Given that the judge thought the pre-meditation was...

Any position is extreme to a fence-sitter. The Conservatives have been touted as a future coalition party for National since ACT leader John Banks' donations scandal. Leader Colin Craig has risen to prominence lately with controversial views on promiscuity and gay marriage. Now Mr Dunne – who has a confidence and supply deal with National – has launched an attack on the political newcomers . And he says he should know, as two of his former MPs – Larry Baldock and Gordon Copeland – stood for the Conservatives in last year's elections. Mr Baldock was third on the party list, while Mr Copeland stood in Hutt South. "They're extreme," he said. " Look at Larry Baldock's fanaticism over smacking. Copeland, the fact he left UnitedFuture over smacking, for goodness sake, when it was a conscience issue. "Any relationship with the Conservative Party ... suggests it's going to be dogma on one side versus pragmatism on the other side, and I th...

When the Government decrees how kids are to be raised there will be casualties along the way, even amongst those who administer the new regime. CYF worker loses employment case . I'm sure his kids lives will be so much better now that he has lost his job.