Smacking ban seen as way to cut child abuse

Dr Joan Durrant says Sweden's smacking ban has reduced child abuse to "virtually zero". Picture / Mark Mitchell

Canadian psychologist Joan Durrant will wade into New Zealand's sensitive smacking debate today with a Government-funded speech about the success of Sweden's anti-smacking law.

Dr Durrant, who has spent 15 years studying Swedish social policy, has been sponsored by the Ministry of Justice to give the keynote speech at the opening of the 10th Australasian conference on child abuse and neglect in Wellington.

Her work, arguing that Sweden's 1979 ban on smacking has reduced child abuse in that country to "virtually zero", was attacked two years ago by American researcher Robert Larzelere, who accused her of "unconditional commitment to an anti-smacking perspective".

But she will defend her conclusions at the conference, which comes two weeks before submissions close on Green MP Sue Bradford's controversial private member's bill to remove a legal defence allowing parents to use "reasonable" force to discipline their children.

Sweden has a lower rate of child deaths due to abuse and "undetermined" causes than 20 out of 27 developed countries. New Zealand has the sixth-highest rate of child deaths.

Dr Durrant said yesterday that Sweden had reduced its child deaths hugely through a series of legal changes since 1957.

Corporal punishment was banned in schools in 1962, 28 years before New Zealand followed suit. In 1979, Sweden became the first country to ban all physical punishment.

Six other countries have since banned smacking: Austria, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Iceland and Norway.

"That inhibits people from hitting," Dr Durrant said. "If they know it's not allowed, they are less likely to do it if they get the urge.

"In our countries [Canada and New Zealand] we don't know when it's time to intervene, and then when we do intervene it's in a much more coercive and punitive way than it is in Sweden."

Dr Larzelere, in a paper published by Families First and the Christian Institute, said the facts were the complete opposite to Dr Durrant's conclusions.

He said the number of physical assaults by relatives against children under age 7 increased by 489 per cent, from 99 in 1981 to 583 in 1994.

In the 7-14 age group, the biggest increase was assaults by children under 15 on other children - up from 116 a year for children born in 1984 to 718 a year for children born a decade later.

"Thus those raised after the ban on smacking are increasingly likely to be perpetrators of such assaults as they grow up," Dr Larzelere said.

But Dr Durrant said the increases were due to a changed definition of assault, not a rise in parental violence.

The increase in reported assaults by children on children was due to an anti-bullying campaign.

She said Sweden provided education for all new parents on alternative ways of handling stress caused by children.

When she lived in Sweden with her baby son, now aged 9, the state provided protective rings to put around the stove to stop her child getting burned.

"Parent education is universally accessible and universally accessed. It's not just for at-risk parents. The Swedes recognise that all parents are at risk because of the stresses of life."

Justice Ministry spokesman Jeremy Seed said the ministry did not choose Dr Durrant, but agreed to sponsor the conference and was offered a package that included her.

Child deaths

Deaths from maltreatment, per 100,000 children aged under 15

1. Portugal 3.7
2. Mexico 3.0
3. USA 2.4
4. France 1.4
5. Hungary 1.3
6. NEW ZEALAND 1.3
7. Czech Republic 1.2
8. Belgium 1.1
9. Slovakia 1.0
10. Japan 1.0
11. Austria* 1.0
12. Canada 1.0
13. Switzerland 0.9
14. Britain 0.9
15. Poland 0.9
16. Finland* 0.8
17. Denmark* 0.8
18. Germany* 0.8
19. Australia 0.8
20. South Korea 0.8
21. Sweden* 0.6
22. Netherlands 0.6
23. Norway* 0.3
24. Ireland 0.3
25. Italy 0.2
26. Greece 0.2
27. Spain 0.1
*Countries which ban smacking

Source: Unicef, 2003. Includes deaths "of undetermined intent".