Bill to Improve Child Protection Laws Progresses

A new bill that seeks to enhance the protection of child victims of domestic violence passed its first reading in parliament.
The Child and Family Protection Bill will amend the Domestic Violence Act 1995, the Care of Children Act 2004, and the Adoption Act 1955 and will address the limitations of the current legislation that restrict the ability of the state to protect the welfare and best interests of children and families.

The measures outlined in the Child and Family Protection Bill include:
Amending the Care of Children Act 2004 to ensure that children who are victims of psychological violence receive greater protection
Ensuring a focus on the best interests of the child by enabling courts to review parent contact arrangements within a few weeks of a temporary protection order being made
Avoiding any opportunity for a gap between a temporary and a final protection order that could result in protected persons having no protection
Clarifying that when a protected person dies, their children will remain protected
Creating a new of offence under the Adoption Act for improperly inducing consent in the adoption of a child.
This bill is the last legislative amendment required for New Zealand to ratify the optional protocol to the United Nation's Convention on the Rights of the Child Protocol on the Sale of Children, Child Prostitution and Pornography. The optional protocol was signed by New Zealand in September 2000 but has yet to be ratified.

The bill has been sent to a Select Committee and submissions will be called for in the coming months.

The bill is available in full at: http://www.legislation.govt.nz/bill/government/2009/0072/latest/DLM22959...