Children are unbeatable

You kinda expect it when there’s a discussion on the physical disciplining of kids. There’s always one who will bleat with authority that, “Being smacked didn’t do me any harm”… I bet somewhere deep in that individual’s psyche it did. And now we see David Lammy advocating physical discipline towards kids as apparently lack of discipline caused the riots….apparently!

I have to say when this was first raised with me I was pretty disparaging. But I started to listen. These parents are scared to smack their children and paranoid that social workers will get involved and take their children away.

Lammy, who admitted to smacking his three- and five-year-old sons, said working-class parents should be able to physically discipline their children to prevent them from joining gangs and getting involved in knife crime.

He added: “The law used to allow ‘reasonable chastisement’, but current legislation stops actions that lead to a reddening of the skin – which for a lot of my non-white residents isn’t really an issue.”

“The ability to exercise their own judgment in relation to discipline and reasonable chastisement has been taken away,” he said.

Firstly, I am appalled Lammy smacks his young children and secondly, what the hell is “reasonable chastisement”… Reasonable chastisement is an elastic term that can be stretched beyond the limits.

Victoria Climbié and “Baby P” lived in Tottenham. The parental figures for both these two children could have argued that they had the moral right to “chastise” them. Both of those children were murdered by either a parent or a close relative (great aunt regarding Victoria Climbié ) yet Lammy doesn’t seem to understand the political significance. Where do you draw the line? Parents who beat their kids senseless could happily argue that they were simply telling them off…”Never did me any harm”…

Violence in families exposes power relations, kids are seen as an addendum of parents and a kind of property therefore physical discipline is deemed acceptable. In the past, patriarchal norms dictated that a man could discipline his wife and kids with a stick or whip no wider than his thumb. Would Lammy argue that if a woman misbehaves in the home she should get a hard slap (as long as you don’t leave a mark same with the kids)? She’s stepping out of line, arguing back and misbehaving…. You need to teach her a lesson and to show who has got the power. Because, let’s face it, it’s on similar lines to what he’s advocating!

Violence is about power and control. When you hit someone who is far less powerful than you it gives a sense of relief, a rush of  adrenaline and seeing that the immediate result is that the kid or young person is behaving themselves gives a sense of victory. But what of the individual who has been exposed to the violence? Some victory….

Violence begets violence. I know adults who have experienced violence in the home and school say you become desensitised by it and it becomes normalised. And it also instills a belief that if you want to get by as a kid in life and you want to assert your own authority then the only way is to resort to violence…cos that solves everything, doesn’t it?

Lammy sees it all from the parents point of view (and with his emphasis on working class families is rather interesting and insulting….) and not from a kid. If as a kid you were hit, how did it feel like? Painful? Humiliated? Hurt? Angry? Shocked? Worthless? Is Lammy concerned? Has Lammy spoken to children’s charities?

This is what the NSPCC say:

Research commissioned by the DCSF (IPSOS MORI 2008, Sherbert Research 2007) shows that a significant number of children continue to be hit. Focus group research commissioned by the government with children and young people highlights the extent to which physical punishment can be routinely used; children recounted experiences of being smacked for forgetting to tidy their bedroom, talking back or for accidentally knocking something over (Sherbert Research, 2007).
Most children taking part in an earlier NCB and Save the Children research study described a smack as a ‘hard hit’ or a ‘very hard hit’ (NCB, Save the Children 1998).

And

A total of 23 countries worldwide have now legislated to make all forms of physical punishment against children illegal in all settings. The UK is now one of only five EU countries that have not yet legislated, or committed to legislating, to give children equal protection from assault.

So instead of encouraging violence against kids, Lammy should be arguing that kids and young people should be treated as equals and as the same as adults. Nobody should experience violence.

I remember as a kid myself that some of the biggest bullies in the playground were ones who were experiencing violence in the home. It’s about being able to assert your power and authority over someone who is less powerful. Is that what Lammy wants to instil? Who is the biggest bully? Violence has a negative impact on self-worth, confidence and self-esteem. Does Lammy want to see more damaged adults out there?

The riots in the summer weren’t about lack of discipline but about deprivation, poverty, victimatisation, criminalisation, unemployment, racism, racist policing with the trigger being the shooting of Mark Duggan which all exploded on the streets. Lammy prefers to indulge in the politics of distraction as examining the real underlying issues would implicate the previous New Labour government which Lammy was a part of.

Violence solves nothing, if anything violence begets violence.

Maybe Lammy should be reading the articles on Children Are Unbeatable. Might learn something!

URGENT ACTION: Stop the Welfare Bill

From the LRC website

MPs will be debating the Welfare Reform Bill on Wednesday 1 February 2012, which is the day after the Lords final debate. This is quite clearly a tactic to prevent campaigning and lobbying of MPs which is an attack on democracy. There are important issues at stake – protecting the disabled, including young disabled people and those with cancer, people on housing benefit, lone parents and larger families (details below).

Please email your MP today to lobby them to support the amendments passed by the Lords. If you don’t know who is your MP, find out here.

If you do not have time to write your own letter, you can use the PCS template letter here to email your MP.

Amendment 12 – Protecting Housing Benefit
The amendment seeks to prevent a change to the definition of under-occupation currently used by the Department for Communities and Local Government. The Bill paves the way for a much tougher test than at present, with a hefty under-occupation penalty – a cut to the housing benefit – for those whose accommodation fails the new test.
This amendment has been supported by housing charities as it penalises people with extra bedrooms. This means for instance that someone who becomes unemployed who lives alone and has two small bedrooms will be driven further into debt and may face homelessness. In many parts of the country there may not be a supply of one bedroom flats for people to live in.
As an alleged social evil under-occupancy has only really been trailed by the government since the summer. There has not been any period of research and debate about what the effects of these measures may be.

Amendment 36A – Protecting young disabled people
To ensure young people who are very severely disabled and who are assessed as qualifying for the support group continue to be entitled to contributory employment support allowance (ESA) in the future.
This is an important social object as this specific benefit gives independence to young disabled people. Stopping this benefit would not save much money but would wreck lives. The typical disability would be a young person who has learning difficulties. Having contributory ESA makes people much vulnerable to exploitation. Many will go onto means test ESA instead and will require greater support to do so as a result of the greater complexity instead with barely any saving (as the means tested benefit will be for the same amount for most people) to the public purse.

Amendment 38 – oppose the introduction of a 12-month limit on which those in the work-related activity group (WRAG) are able to claim contributory ESA
12-month limit on contributory ESA will cause much more poverty as after one year the benefit will become means-tested. A couple living in the same house, one working just above the minimum wage the other on contributory ESA, the salary of the worker is not taken into consideration BUT once it becomes means-tested it will. Therefore it will increase poverty and takes away independence. Particularly affected will be claimants who have a low paid working partner. Ironically in the view of the policy objective of making sure work pays if partners of contributory ESA claimants move back into work they will be worse off under the government’s proposal. If some moves back into work while their partner is on contributory ESA then the ESA is unaffected and the household gets a clear increase in income. If the contributory ESA is replaced by a means tested benefit any income from a start in work will be drastically reduced by the tapers that exist in the means tested regime.This tapers will become much steeper with the introduction of Universal Credit.

Amendment 38A – Protecting those with limited work capacity due to cancer
(a) where a person is receiving treatment for cancer when entitlement shall continue for so long as the person has (or is treated as having) limited capacity for work; or
(b) the person has (or is treated as having) limited capacity for work as a consequence of a cancer diagnosis.
When people are fighting cancer they need support not being bullied by the state to find work. People with their jobs being held open for them until they get better will be unable to claim JSA as one of the conditions of entitlement of JSA is that you do not have a job. Again the irony is that people will be asking their employers to dismiss them for incapacity in order to have food to eat! Some people will be forced from work and on to long term benefits by this measure. It will also force people into pointless job searching to comply with the JSA rules when they should be concentrating on getting better.

Amendment 59 – Exclude Child Benefit from the benefit cap
The arithmetic does not make sense a household with an earned income of £26000 will be getting the full amount of Child Benefit for the children within it. The important social policy objective of giving women independence within a relationship will be lost. The children will suffer if a male claimant holds back money from his female partner. This does happen in abusive relationships. It also makes escaping domestic violence much more difficult by women in abusive relationships also caught by the benefit cap.

Amendment 62C – Oppose government proposals to charge single parents for using the Child Support Agency
Most women caught in poverty do not have the resources to pursue absent partners. Whether they are on benefit or balancing work with being a lone parent they are not often in a position to deal with getting money from an unwilling or in impecunious absent parent.