27 August 1996

PRESS RELEASE

The current spate of serious youth offending in Christchurch is not due to a lack of social workers or similar resources, as has been claimed, said FREE's Australasia Area Coordinator, Darryl Ward, today. To claim that this is the source of the problem is an "ambulance at the bottom of the cliff" approach, and the root cause of the problem should be examined.

FREE is resolute that the root of this problem is fatherlessness. In the USA, 63 % of youth suicides are from fatherless homes, (U.S. D.H.H.S. Bureaus of Census); 71 % of high school dropouts are from fatherless homes, (National Principals Association Report on the State of High Schools ); 70 % of all juveniles in state operated institutions are from fatherless homes, (U.S. Dept of Justice, Special Report Sept 1988), 85 % of all youths in prisons grew up in fatherless homes, (Fulton Co. Georgia Jail Populations, Texas Department of Corrections 1992); 85% of all children that exhibit behavioural disorders come from fatherless homes, (Center for Disease Control); 80% of rapists motivated with displaced anger come from fatherless home, (Criminal Justice & Behaviour, Vol 14, p. 403-26, 1978); 75% of all adolescent patients in chemical abuse centers come from fatherless homes, (Rainbows for all God`s Children); 21% of all children today live in a household without a father figure, (Bureau of the Census).

Literally hundreds of thousands of New Zealand children's parents have separated or divorced. Contrary to popular myth, most of them are not abandoned by their fathers; over 70% of divorces in New Zealand are initiated by wives, not husbands. Over 20,000 children in New Zealand every year lose contact with one of their parents which leaves a vast number of disenfranchised fathers looking to see what party, if any, will acknowledge the problem of fatherlessness in its entirety, and not remain focussed on the issue of child support, as if that is all fathers are good for.

FREE is confident that if a survey was taken of youth offenders who commit serious crime, whether in Christchurch, or the rest of the country, a significant majority will have grown up without their fathers, concluded Ward, who challenges social agencies to research this for themselves.