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Archived Press Releases 2006 31st May 2006

Call to reintroduce military training for wayward kids

(31st May 2006)

A meeting of high-ranking officials including Police, the Ministry of Justice, Child Youth and Family and the Children’s Commission has been slammed as a waste of time by a criminal justice watchdog organization.

The meeting was held to discuss the crisis surrounding a shortage of youth justice beds which has led to teenagers being held in police cells for extended periods.

The Sensible Sentencing Trust say that until these officials wake up to the fact that the politically correct experiment has failed, nothing will change and that the level of crime we have reflects the society we have created.

Trust spokesman, Garth McVicar said that young people are emerging from dysfunctional families and a dysfunctional education system that teaches them their "rights" but not their responsibilities. "Until we get back to basics and get rid of this "rights" based nonsense and return to a "responsibility" based – family focused society – nothing will change. Kids need functioning mums and dads.”

"“The short term solution to this problem is to reintroduce compulsory military training right now, these kids need to be taught discipline, respect and accountability, and they need it yesterday!"

"This is not our kids' fault - we have allowed politicians to introduce legislation that has used our kids as guinea-pigs, removing every concept of accountability. Everyone knows their "rights" - what about their responsibilities?" McVicar said.

"The level of crime in recent years has increased in equal proportion to the excuses the bureaucrats and intellectuals have made for the criminals."

"This head in the sand mentality will simply escalate the problem, while we have officals wringing their hands and politicians like Sue Bradford wanting to ban smacking, our kids will continue to be the scapegoats of this failed social experiment."

McVicar warned, "Our kids will be the losers, Ban smacking – build prisons"

Regards,

Garth McVicar
National Spokesperson,
Sensible Sentencing Trust.