Judith Collins MP
National Party Family Spokeswoman

13 November 2003

Taxpayer subsidises gang houses

National Party Family spokeswoman Judith Collins says the death of a 15-year-old boy in a gang-run Auckland drug house underlines the deteriorating state of Kiwi families.

"It's evidence of a much bigger problem which I've seen first hand in my own Auckland electorate.

"Only recently Police in my area picked up a 15 year old girl who was prostituting herself at $400 a night to pay back local gangs for her 'P' drug addiction.

"When they returned the young girl home, her mother knew exactly what was going on but let it continue nonetheless.

"Is this the kind of childhood we want for our kids?

"Parents must take more responsibility, but the Government and its allies have done little to stop failing families," says Ms Collins.

"They have passed liberal 'Prostitution Law Reform' that is helping normalise this activity for a good portion of our community.

"They're moving to make fathers feel irrelevant, promoting legislation that paves the way for female fathers and redefining the family as 'any group with a psychological attachment'.

"Even gangs qualify under that definition," Ms Collins notes.

"Just today, Minister Steve Maharey told the Social Services Select Committee that 'whether you are in the Mongrel Mob or Rotary, you have the right to a [state] house'.

"No wonder the Families Commission Bill's definition of a family is so wide that the Mongrel Mob will be able to qualify," says Ms Collins.

"Meanwhile, the Prime Minister's leading the charge to change smacking laws as her Government allows child support to go uncollected and removes the work test requirement for those on the DPB

"Labour's also closing rural schools, destroying close knit school communities and publicly courting Parliamentary support from a party that wants to liberalise cannabis laws.

"It's quite outrageous the attention the Government is now giving to a national database for dogs, when children are being valued for the income and benefits they attract," says Ms Collins.

"This minority Government is now reaping what it has sown.

"It is paying the price for four years of social engineering with children's lives. It must stop the sabotage of traditional family values," says Ms Collins.

Ends

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