KEY POINTS:
National Party leader John Key wants to sit around a table with Labour and the Greens to try to hammer out an alternative to the controversial "anti-smacking" bill, but neither party is warming to the idea.
The Greens say Mr Key should first meet child welfare groups and invite Sue Bradford into the National caucus, while Labour says it will sit down with Mr Key only when he produces something of substance.
But Mr Key has won an ally in the United Future Party, which has described the proposal for cross-party talks as "common sense".
In a speech to a Salvation Army conference in Christchurch yesterday, Mr Key hit out at New Zealand's high rate of domestic violence, but claimed Sue Bradford's bill to amend Section 59 of the Crimes Act would succeed only in criminalising parents who smacked their children to correct behaviour.
Mr Key conceded that a proposed amendment to the bill by National MP Chester Borrows to allow light smacking was likely to fail, and said the party was happy to "dump it" in favour of cross-party talks.
He denied the move was a u-turn by his party.
"I say to Helen Clark and Sue Bradford, if you are genuine in your statements, and genuine in your intentions, then let's get around the table and come up with a set of words we all agree on," Mr Key said.
"I think there is every chance they might agree."
Social Development Minister David Benson-Pope said Mr Key's speech yesterday was "vague and confusing".
National had so far been polarising the smacking debate and "deliberately scaremongering rather than debating the bill on its merits".
He said Mr Key had to prove he was serious about addressing child abuse and "that it's not just another case of him shifting his position to suit the audience".
Ms Bradford said Mr Key's proposal was not the first attempt to get a compromise.
But her party was not willing to lower the threshold for "acceptable physical violence towards children".
"If Mr Key is willing to arrange for me to talk with the National caucus, I will arrange a meeting for him with the representatives of Plunket, Unicef, Barnardos and Save the Children, so that he can talk with them face to face about the ideas he put forward in his speech," Ms Bradford said.
"If Mr Key and I both approach our respective meetings in a constructive spirit, perhaps we will be able to reach a positive conclusion on this divisive issue."
Barnardos, one of the groups that supports Ms Bradford's bill, said yesterday it felt National had ample chance to discuss the bill with other parties at the select committee stage.
"I would have thought that was the opportunity," said spokesman Mike Coleman.
