Perspective with Heather du Plessis-Allan: Why have we had such a bad run of child abuse incidents?

I want to talk about kids being bashed by their families.

We've had a really bad run of it - I don't know if you've realized - in the last few weeks. As far as I can see, just in the last 8 weeks, we've had the toddler in the suitcase, and we've had the baby in the bin in Auckland.

We've also had a 2-month-old go to hospital with serious injuries that happened today, we've had a 3-month-old taken to hospital in Wellington in June, and we've had a 6-month-old critically injured at a Foxton Beach house in July.

And we've hardly talked about this. I mean, we've talked about the toddler in the suitcase yesterday, world media talked about it too because it is so bizarre, it's hard to ignore.

We also talked about the baby in the bin, that got about a day's worth of coverage, again, because that was pretty out there - putting a baby in a bin. 

But everything else, almost no coverage. Now, do you know why that is?

I mean, part of it is obviously that this is now not unusual anymore. We just bash our babies all the time in this country apparently - but also because you're not actually allowed to talk about it.

I don't know if you realize this, but the moment that Oranga Tamariki, which is the new CYFS, uplifts a kid, the Family Court orders basically automatic blanket suppression on it.

Which means the police can't say anything, it means OT itself can't say anything, it means the media can't say anything. So the news coverage just basically dies.

We get: "baby's gone to hospital," and that's the end of it. No more coverage.

It's actually only when the child dies that we can talk about it in detail because there is now no young person to protect anymore.

Now, isn't that the opposite of what we want? I mean, I think this is doing our kids a disservice. 

I understand why we did this in the first place, why we put these suppression orders in - the idea was to protect the privacy of these young people. But what it is also doing is protecting the privacy of the thugs in their families who put them in hospital or in the suitcase or in the bin.

And what it also means is that no one then talks about what's going on. We're not horrified by the detail because there is no detail, so we don't talk about it, including politicians - and they should be the ones pitching solutions.

At the rate that we're bashing our kids, this should be an election issue every single election - but it's not because we hardly talk about it because of the rules. So surely the rules should change.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Listen, I want to talk about kids being bashed by
their families. We've had a really bad run of it.
I don't know if you realized in the last few weeks,
as far as I can see, just in the last
eight weeks, just what I've seen, We've had the toddler
in the suitcase. We've had the baby in the bin
in Auckland. We've had a two month old go to
hospital with serious injuries that happened today. We've had a
three month old taken to hospital in Wellington in June,
and we've had a six month old critically injured at

(00:21):
a Foxton beach house in July. And we've hardly talked
about this. I mean, we've talked about the toddler in
the suitcase yesterday. I mean world media talked about the
toddler in the suitcase yesterday because it is so bizarre
it's hard to ignore. We talked about the baby and
the bin. That got about a day's worth of coverage
again because that was pretty out there, Ah, putting a
baby in a bin, But everything else almost no coverage.

(00:43):
Now do you know why that is? I mean, part
of it is obviously that this is now not unusual anymore.
We just bash our babies all the time in this
country apparently, but also because you're not actually allowed to
talk about it. I don't know if you realize this,
but if the moment that autong Atomadiki, which is the
new sif's the moment that ot uplift's a kid, the
family court orders basically automatic blanket suppression on it, which

(01:03):
means the police can't say anything. It means ot itself
can't say anything. It means the media can't say anything.
So the news coverage just basically dies. We got baby's
gone to hospital. That's the end of it, no more coverage.
It's actually only when the child dies that we can
talk about it in detail, because there is now no
young person to protect anymore. Now, isn't that the opposite
of what we want? I mean, I think this is
doing our kids a disservice. I understand why we did

(01:26):
this in the first place. While we put these suppression
orders in the idea was to protect the privacy of
these young people. But what it is also doing is
it's protecting the privacy of the thugs and their families
who put them in hospital or in the suitcase or
in the bin. And what it also means is that
no one then talks about what's going on. We're not
horrified by the detail because there is no details, so
we don't talk about it, including politicians. They should be

(01:46):
the ones pitching solutions. At the rate that we're bashing
our kids. This should be an election issue every single election,
but it's not because we hardly talk about it because
of the rules. So surely the rules should change. For
more from Heather Duplessy, Allen Drive and Live to News Talks,
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on iHeartRadio.