Hosted by His Worship, Hon. John Banks, QSO, Mayor Auckland City and chaired by Bruce Pilbrow, CEO Parents Inc.

Parents Inc. holds a number of one off events throughout the year, the largest being the Auckland Mayoral Fathers’ Breakfast. This event was first launched in 1994 by the then Mayor of Auckland, Les Mills. Over the last 15 years thousands of fathers have attended this hugely popular annual breakfast.

“Being a Dad is the most important job a man can do, so we’re offering advice and support to fathers so they can do their job better. The breakfast is also really good fun and a great feed,” says Ian Grant.

Each breakfast has had a star line-up of speakers, such as Nick Farr-Jones, Todd Blackadder, Sean Fitzpatrick, Stephen Tindall and Neil Finn. “The speakers we’ve had at the breakfasts over the years have been from all sorts of professions — sports, business, medicine, entertainment — but they all have one thing in common,” says Ian, “They’re all outstanding fathers.”

Speakers present their personal experience of fatherhood, sharing the things that have worked and the things that haven’t. The practical nature of the speakers’ advice, combined with the atmosphere generated by more than 700 fathers in a room, makes for a powerful event.

Venue: Vector Arena; 42 Mahuhu Crescent Parnell, Auckland

Cost:$55 per person
$550 per table of 11
(includes cooked breakfast)

TO BOOK ONLINE CLICK HERE

Phone Parents Inc. on 09 524 1387
Email: [email protected]

Man meets a lady in 2003. They have a casual sexual relationship. Nothing more, nothing less. The man uses condoms every time. Lady says she is pregnant to the man. 2004 a son is born. Man is adamant that he used condoms every time. So man asks lady for a DNA test. Lady agrees and the DNA test was done. The lady gives the man the results which states that he is 99.9% the father to this child. So man accepts the fact that he has become a father due to the results of a DNA test. Lady says to man “I want the DNA test back to destroy the evidence as she didn’t want the son to find out that this has ever happened. Man didn’t think that there was anything wrong with this, so he gives the DNA test back to the lady. He says to the lady that he will do everything he can to support his son. The man has never lived with this lady, so he was picking his son up either every weekend or every second weekend to spend time with his son. He paid for most of the necessities for his son i.e. nappies, formula, wipes, baby food etc. Spending almost $6,000 dollars in the first three years of the child’s life. He set up a bank account with the lady in the form of a trust for their son. Man putting into the account over 5 years of the child’s life $6,500, lady only putting $125. Man paying $60 a fortnight into the lady bank account to pay for daycare. Although the lady wasn’t working she wanted time out from her son.
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Leah Ward Sears became the first woman and youngest person appointed to Georgia’s highest court in 1992.

But she stepped down this week as Chief Justice of the Georgia Supreme Court after her brother’s suicide. She found amongst his personal effects a questionnaire he had completed in 2005 for a church class.

The very first question was a fill-in-the-blank that went like this: “At the end of my life, I’d love to be able to look back and know I’d done something about …..”

“Fathers,” Tommy wrote.

When asked to identify something that angered him that could be changed, Tommy wrote, “Re-establishment of equity and balance and sanity within the American family.”

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By Barbara Faithfull

On 16th June 2009 I wrote (in “The fraudulent case against corporal punishment”) : “The anti-corporal punishment lobbyists operate dishonestly” etc. Nevertheless I hardly expected them so soon to provide the excellent proof of that assertion which has come to hand over the past few days via abuse of the scientific process. Professional statisticians are strangely slow to challenge this sort of deceitful lobbying, so I feel bound to make some effort in that direction.
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From Peter Zohrab

What do people think of what Judge Boshier said on TV One ? You can read what he said at tvnz.co.nz.

Watch the video here.

In particular, what do you think about what he said about Family Court statistics? You can see the statistics at:
justice.govt.nz/

He is saying that the stats prove that fathers and mothers are treated equally. What is our response to that?
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Sunday Star Times 28 June 2009
A Christchurch dad who let his nine-year-old son and four-year-old daughter play at a school park unsupervised is furious the government’s child welfare agency is now investigating his family. The case highlights the dilemma parents face in striking a balance between protecting their children and risk them becoming bubble-wrapped kids and giving them a taste of the freedom and independence parents themselves enjoyed as youngsters. READ MORE
Children’s Commissioner says parents took ‘risk’ letting kids play alone The Press 29 June 2009 READ MORE
Family First Comment : The concerning aspect about this case is that CYF is investigating the family. Parents take ‘risks’ every day as they allow their children to undertake potentially ‘dangerous’ activities e.g. letting a son play rugby, letting a daughter do gymnastics, walking to school etc. Previously we could trust our communities to keep an eye out for each other. We are quickly creating a ‘paranoid parenting’ environment. An investigation by CYF suggests that these parents are being irresponsible. Or is that where we’ve got to as a society??

Read More: Family First News

The family court, women’s refuge and cyfs are the triangle of violence in New Zealand.
They are unaccountable, unrepentant and above the law.

The equation is, as always, the same:
A father in jail, mother dead, children left as orphans.
Is this what the family Court is for?
(more…)

We’ve always argued that good parents are being criminalised and harmed by the anti-smacking law and we currently have a number of cases in front of both the Prime Minister and other Cabinet ministers for their consideration. These have been independently reviewed by a senior policeman.

In the latest case covered by the media we’ve been saying that this is a ‘good dad’. And we stand by that .

We would never support a parent who ‘repeatedly throws their child to the ground’. But in this case that NEVER happened!

How do we know ? Because we had an observer in the court who heard ALL the facts (unlike the media who relied only on what the witness alleged in the police report!)

In the same way that the anti-correction lobby groups use words like ‘beat’ ‘thrash’ and ‘violent’ to describe a loving parent who may use a smack to correct a child, in this current case, words count.

Please take a moment to read what our observer wrote (our emphasis added):
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An Australian mother has been convicted of murder over the starving death of her seven-year-old daughter, who at the time of her death appeared mummified.

The prosecution claimed that the mother starved her daughter to death because she was autistic and too much to handle.

At the time of death, the child weighed only nine kilos and she was left to die in her urine-stained room.

Her hair was matted and her fingernails were black.

It was her father who called the ambulance. As the shock of the death set in, he lashed out at the Department of Community Services.

By delivering this verdict, the jury accepted that the woman deliberately starved her child to death but that her husband, who lived in the same house, did not intend for her to die.

“Shocking figures have revealed that the number of women who have been charged with domestic violence-related assault has soared by 159 per cent over the past eight years.

The figures, from the New South Wales Bureau of Crime Statistics, show 2336 women faced court on charges of domestic violence in 2007, mainly for bashing their husbands, compared with just 818 in 1999.

Men’s groups said yesterday they were happy that police were finally taking men seriously but it remained tough for husbands to admit they had been attacked by their wives.

Research shows women tend to use guns, knives, boiling liquids and irons to attack their partners.

The increase in violence, which is often fuelled by alcohol, has sparked calls for refuges for men.”

It’s ridiculous to describe this as shocking – but I am just quoting the source.

Full story: http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,,25667548-5005941,00.html

Labour’s spokesperson for Women’s Affairs Sue Moroney, is attacking Pansy Wong for not giving Labour what they want. But you have to hand it to Pansy Wong and the National party. They are not in a hurry to bankrupt NZ over feminist demands nor turn us into state communist control.

Minister of Women’s Affairs, Pansy Wong, today backed away from commitments she made to the National Council of Women to work on fair pay for women, Labour’s spokesperson for Women’s Affairs, Sue Moroney says.

That is ALLEGED commitments BTW.

Sue goes on to say “The women of New Zealand are not fooled by this stalling tactic. Unfortunately the prospects of women achieving pay equity are getting further away under a National Government.”

I for one think National is being smart. They are going over the research to find the real reasons we have pay issues. It certainly is equal pay for equal work and we certainly have more trained women in NZ than we do men. And the ‘glass ceiling’ doesn’t exist to all the women who have jobs above it.

Maybe I should send some ideas to our leaders from the UK like this one.
(more…)

The anti-corporal punishment lobbyists operate dishonestly, because they lie about their true motive and are aided and abetted in this by the news media.
By Barbara Faithfull

Why does the New Zealand news media mislead by not disclosing that it is really United Nations-backed leftist ideology that drives anti-corporal punishment activism? Why are these activists given an easy ride and never confronted about their true motivation? Clearly, because if this was revealed their campaign opposing all corporal punishment would collapse.

For just on thirty years (most of that time as secretary of the now-defunct Credo Society Incorporated) I have observed and monitored a leftist push to have corporal punishment outlawed in NZ, first in the school and now in the home. Along with this have been (largely successful) similar moves to undermine other forms of traditional authority, such as in the Church, Police force and other institutions of society. (more…)

BBC: A verdict is due this week in “the babes in the freezer” case, in which a French mother is accused of murdering three of her children. BBC Paris correspondent Emma Jane Kirby reports on the mixture of horror and sympathy that the story has aroused. (more…)

1. Nine-year-olds to learn about sex
The Press 15 June 2009

Nine-year-old children are being targeted for more detailed sex education in schools. In Christchurch today, Family Planning is launching a new resource for teachers of late-primary and intermediate-age children. The launch has upset the conservative lobby group Family First, which is urging Family Planning to “butt out” and leave sex education to parents. …Year 5 and 6 (nine and 10-year-old) pupils look at pubertal change, friendships, gender, families, menstruation, fertility, conception and personal support. Year 7 and 8 pupils focus more on changing feelings and emotions and their effects on relationships, sexual attraction, decision-making around sexual attraction, conception and birth, contraception and support agencies.

..Family First national director Bob McCoskrie said children should be taught sex education by their parents when they were ready. “The simple message to Family Planning is `butt out and leave it to parents’,” McCoskrie said. “Parents know their kids the best. They know their emotional and moral development best and have their own values. Family Planning should not be interacting with kids of that age.” McCoskrie said schools had become “one-stop shops” for dealing with social problems in the community. Some parents felt overawed by “the sex talk” with their children, so resources should be put in to helping them better understand what was required, McCoskrie said. “It needs to be values-based and we think parents are the ones who determine the values.” READ MORE
Family First Media Release – Sex Education Begins at Home Not School READ MORE

2. Campaign begins for referendum
National Radio 15 June 2009
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Help celebrate Men’s Health Week.
Learn about local events, share latest information!

Join us every Wednesday, 7.30pm, Onehunga Community Centre
83 Church Street, Onehunga

Brendon Smith
Father and Child Trust, Auckland
Ph (09) 525 1690

We aim to provide a safe place for sharing father related issues, with understanding and hoping to strengthen our fathering abilities.

I used the opportunity to ask Family Planning about resources for fathers and contraception for men particularly because I wanted to know about the injection still in trial stage. I quoted the expectation that men will have something available in 5 years and got the response, “Everything is 5 years.” (more…)

Linley Boniface is a regular columnist for the Dominion Post . On Monday, she published an column entitled ” A Question smacking of deceit” which attacked the Referendum and Family First.

Statements included:
“Despite clear evidence that the world around us is chock-full of people who couldn’t successfully raise a family of tadpoles to adulthood, we believe anyone above the age of 18 can be trusted to use restraint, caution and common sense in deciding exactly how hard to hit the children in their care. This is presumably why, in July and August, we will go through the utter tedium of yet another public consultation exercise on the child discipline law…”

“Bob McCoskrie, self-appointed champion of “the family”, is given far more media coverage than Unicef, Barnardos, Save the Children or any of the other organisations that support the act, and his continued bleating that the law victimises good parents is largely left unchallenged. The referendum question – “Should a smack as part of good parental correction be a criminal offence in New Zealand?” – not only implies that all good parents smack, but wrongly suggests that a parent who smacks will be prosecuted. It is outrageous that, in a recession, we should be required to spend $10 million for the privilege of answering this deceitful question…”

WE RESPONDED and our article was printed in today’s edition of the Dominion Post – and is reprinted below for your convenience.
(more…)

On the basis of information currently available to the public, I disapprove of Dr Worth’s behaviour concerning Neelam Choudary but only because it appears he disrespected the sanctity of marriage, both his own and that of Mrs Choudary.

There have been several criticisms of Dr Worth during his political career, but before jumping to judgement it may be important to consider his side of those stories and his impressive naval, diplomatic, professional and charitable service for which he was appointed an Officer of the British Empire and was made a knight in the Venerable Order of St John of Jerusalem. I have no wish to defend Dr Worth per se but there are many aspects to this story of relevance to men in general. (more…)

1. ‘Honest’ Report on Child Abuse Welcomed
Family First Media Release 4 June 2009

Family First NZ is welcoming a report from the Children’s Commissioner on child abuse released today, and says that it backs the call for a Royal Commission on child abuse. “The report entitled ‘ Death and serious injury from assault of children aged under 5 years in Aotearoa New Zealand: A review of international literature and recent findings’ makes an honest assessment of the real causes of child abuse and reinforces the findings of previous UNICEF and CYF reports that we have quoted,” says Bob McCoskrie, National Director of Family First NZ. “The anti-smacking law was a smoke screen for dealing with the real, and much harder to deal with, causes of child abuse. It has meant that ‘normal’ families have been targeted because they’re easier to deal with, rather than the dysfunctional non-compliant families who need support and possibly intervention. This report identifies those causes and is so honest that it could almost be labeled politically incorrect.”

Risk factors for child abuse in the report included :

• ethnicity (including the high rate of abuse amongst Maori)
• drug and alcohol abuse
• mental illness
• unsupported young mothers with little or no antenatal care
• presence of a non-biological parent
• family breakdown, severe conflict and ongoing domestic violence
• poverty, instability and unemployment

READ MORE
READ Full Report
Family First Comment : This report endorses what we have been saying about child abuse all along – see www.stoptheabuse.org.nz .

2. Home best for babies says doctor
Sunday Star Times 07 June 2009
(more…)

My ex husband and I signed a private custody agreement when we separated 7 years ago (we are both now re-married to new spouses). Over the years it has been increasingly difficult for me to enforce this arrangement in it’s original form as he seems to have less time to spend with his children. He has made a number of changes decreasing his time with them and there doesn’t seem to be anything I can do legally to make him stick to it. Or is there?

Excerpt from the Otago Daily Times.

(Skim past the opening religious stuff and you’ll get to some telling insights.)

The “Fathering Our City” report, written by Warwick Pudney and commissioned by Te Korowai Manaaki – Great Start Waitakere and Violence Free Waitakere, was released at the Waitakere City Fathering Hui on May 16.

The key finding of the report is that our major problem with parenting is absenteeism.

Among other things it concludes that: “For both boys and girls, love and dependency can become confused without a father; fatherless males are five times more likely to [commit] suicide; under-fathered girls are more likely to become pregnant; the under-fathered child is more likely to use drugs; fatherless boys are 20 times more likely to end up in prison and fatherless boys are nine times more likely to drop out of high school.”

In short, the problem isn’t how we’ve been parenting but whether or not we’ve been parenting at all.

Absenteeism is rife amongst parents – and fathers in particular – and the cure, surely, is not to penalise those who are staying in the game, even if they are doing the job badly.

A controversial test that reveals the gender of a foetus may be launched in New Zealand within a fortnight.

The American-designed IntelliGender test has sparked a row in New Zealand over whether it would lead to sex-selection abortions, the New Zealand Herald reported.

The test could be used from eight weeks after conception.

The kit went on sale in Australia last month, and its Australian distributor hopes to launch it in New Zealand within a fortnight.

But the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists and anti-abortion group Voice for Life said they were concerned that people would terminate pregnancies on the grounds of sex-selection.

—

What this report doesn’t mention is that leading experts in Australia thought it highly unlikely that the test of a urine sample could determine the gender of the unborn child, particularly so early during the pregnancy.

Education consultant Joseph Driessen said children who came from broken homes were typically 25 per cent behind other children in achievement.

“Boys are affected by divorce very deeply because 85 per cent of custody goes to the mother and guys just disappear. That needs to change,” he told The Press.

“We need to have a family split-up philosophy where we realise that sons need their fathers. All custody and access should be 50-50.”

Full article here. (includes further useful references.)

A 13-year-old boy is recovering in hospital after downing a one-litre bottle of spirits in 30 minutes at a sports training camp.

Wanaka police were investigating an alleged theft of a bottle of alcohol from the bar of a backpackers by a 15-year-old boy.

Constable Greg Nolet said reports from other camp participants indicated the boy had drunk the allegedly stolen bottle of spirits after it was produced by another boy.

People “at some stage” needed to be held responsible for the consequences of “peer pressure”, Mr Nolet said.

—

What I found interesting about this story is a policeman saying that he thought there should be some personal responsibility for consequences. I thought this is a very radical concept for New Zealand. I can’t say I am optimistic but it is fascinating the thought was even published. Obviously a career limiting move by Mr Nolet.

Rotorua police have made an arrest following the death of a one-year-old baby boy.

The boy died on Friday morning at an Edmund Road property. Police were called after his caregivers found him dead in the lounge.

Detective Senior Sergeant Mark Loper says a 29-year-old woman who lives at the address has been charged with assaulting a child. He says results from a post mortem examination are at this time inconclusive but police are waiting on further forensic results to help establish why the boy died.

Mark Loper says police have not previously been called to the address for family violence matters.

The woman will reappear in court on Wednesday.

source: http://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/newsdetail1.asp?storyID=158366