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It is a shame that CYFs do not know what CYFs are doing, the both of which do not know what CYFs are doing.

First CYFs tell us “More than 1000 Maori children were victims of abuse in the past year, a rate far higher than other ethnic groups, Child Youth and Family Services figures show. It dealt with 1010 cases of physical abuse involving Maori children for 2005, compared with 613 Pakeha cases and 451 Pacific Island cases”

Maori babies most at risk, say figures

Then they tell us “Around 5000 children are suspected to be at risk of violence, abuse or neglect every month, statistics from Child Youth and Family show … CYF figures show 58,247 children were reported to be at risk by police and the public from July 2005 to May 2006”.

5000 youngsters reported at risk every month

And than – in the same breath – they tell us “Nationally, around 2500 children are referred to CYF by police every month”. 2,500 per month = 30,000 per year!

2,084? 58,247? 30,000? Can’t CYFs at least co-ordinate to get their facts straight?

Furthermore, 58,247 at-risk children reported to CYFs by Police and the public over an 11-month period, (say 60,000 per annum) is impressive; given Police only attend 63,000 DV incidents a year. Again, many of these must be ‘repeat’ reports by Police of individual children, given we only have about 55,000 new additions to the children ranks each year!

Why do I heap mock and scorn upon fact and figure churned out ad nauseam by Woman’s Refuge and CYFs?

It’s because clearly so many of them are impossible numbers to sustain! If 60,000children are ‘known’ to be at risk each year by these agencies, then logic demands that long-term, say over 20 years, we are talking about 1.2 million children. That is more than the number of children that will be born in New Zealand over that time! In reality, we know some children come to the attention of CYFs repeatedly, and maybe I move in the wrong circles, but most children I know never encounter CYFs. But if even just 10% of them do, then that 10% all have to be referred back to CYFs something like twelve times each to balance the figures!

That is absolutely tragic. And if the true percentage is even less, it becomes more ludicrous (2% would mean each of those 2% being referred 60 times through out their childhood!) Remember the Police said they suspect the true figure is ten times higher – making it 600 times each for 2%! The maths just does not add up, and I suspect the same is true for The Refuge, and CYFs.

With reference to the figures I recently touted in regard to the caseload cited by Women’s Refuge, a similar reality would have to apply. But then, surely many children are ‘clients’ of both CYFs and the Refuge? Which makes for double dipping? What are we doing to these poor children to pass them through a veritable smorgasbord of ‘help’ agencies?

And why now is there suddenly an epidemic of child abuse / violence? We all know that people are more likely to report violence, and leave violent situations. We also know many don’t. But has the current level of child abuse / violence always existed (unreported)? Or has it worsened? And if so, why?

My thesis would be that domestic violence has worsened. Call me sexist. Call me patriarchal. Even call me misogynistic if you want, but I have read, and agree with the premise that you are more likely to be violent towards a ‘partner’ as opposed to a ‘wife’, and to ‘step-children’ than ‘children’. That is not to say that men are not violent towards wife / children, but that they are more violent towards those with whom they have no marital link, and no biological link.

Fathers that are actively involved in the lives of their children are nowhere near as likely to abuse them, sexually or physically. Stepfathers are. I come from an era where I learned that yes, women ‘submitted’ to their husbands, but ALSO that husbands ‘respected’ their wives. Husbands we gentlemen towards their wives. I know reality didn’t always bear that out. But there was seemingly a lot less abuse / violence than there is nowadays.

Maybe the very breakdown of marriage and the family has led to the apparent epidemic in domestic violence? For example, statistics seem relatively consistent that fathers sexually abuse between 1 and 4 percent of Janey victims of child sexual abuse; Stepfathers about 45%; Keep father in the picture, and stepfather out, and the volume of child sexual abuse nearly halves!

If you accept the oft-quoted NZ study reporting 38% of girls will be sexually abused by age 16 (and ignoring flawed definitions that intermediate aged kids realised they were ‘looked at sexually’ sometime in the preceding twelve years, and the PC definition that any hand placed on a thigh constitutes sexual abuse), you would look at the 27,500 baby girls born this year and say: 10,450 of you will be sexually abused, 418 by your fathers, and 4,807 by your stepfathers. Ludicrous, eh?

I wouldn’t hit a cat or a dog. I certainly would hit anyone else – man, woman or child, or sexually abuse any child. I have never made any of the Police / CYFs / Refuge books (that I know about). There really is not a violent bone in my body. I am simply too passive. And I know very few people that would (like I said – I move in the wrong circles). So all those facts and figures touted by The Sisterhood are alien to me. I simply find it incomprehensible that maybe 10% of all children could be referred by Police to CYFs.

The true reason I play with these stats is because we all know they are concocted. Definitions expand to meet the available funding plus 10%. By including woolly definitions of psychological / spiritual / economic abuse – even sexual abuse, as shown above, we can include ever more victims. Figures rise; caseloads rise; funding rises.

The Sisterhood often cite why would women lay false complaints. Yet just today, there was a further report of a false complainant being prosecuted. Why indeed? because they can! It is no different to why they make unfounded accusations in FAMILY Court – because they can! One judge recently opened a Family Court ruling by addressing a series of unfounded claims including a claim the applicant may have sexually abused his child: “I find no evidence …”. If there is not any evidence, why would the respondent make her claims? Because she can!

And how easy to say ‘he keeps thinking violent thoughts – I need help’! Little Janey needs to be kept safe from her father because he ‘might emotionally harm her’! Little Johnny throws tantrums, therefore he might be an anti-socialite pre-criminal! Read the indicators of pre-school anti-social pre-criminal behaviours reported yesterday (don’t let the headline fool you – the article talks of under-five’s):

Catch criminals before they’re 10 – academic

PC social engineering gone mad. Why not simply chip them all at birth, and implode them to death as soon as they digress into any one of a range of pre-determined anti-social practices? That way pre-violent children never grow into violent men.

Maybe that day is coming …