BRINGING UP CHILDREN

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22249, 13 November 1937, Page 11

BRINGING UP CHILDREN

"PARENTS SHOULD CARE FOR THEIR OWN"

MAGISTRATE'S PARTING ADVICE

(POESS ASSOCIATION TELEOHAJf.) AUCKLAND, November 12. Amendments to the Child Welfare Act, with-a view to compelling greater parental control, were advocated by Mr Wyvern Wilson, S.M., who presided for the last time at a sitting of the Children's Court. Mr Wilson, who is senior Magistrate in Auckland, will begin three months' retiring leave on Monday. "The Child Welfare Act under which we have been working was experimental legislation when it became law in 1925, and it has been once amended," he said, addressing his associates. "I think you will agree with me that the time has arrived for further revision of the act. "We .who have been through the work know best the difficulties that have beset the Child Welfare Department, with its various institutions. Juvenile delinquency is in most instances attributable to lack of parental control. It is so often the case that the sins of parents are visited on the children that one is led to admire the provisions of the English act. which enable the Juvenile Court to bind over parents to exercise proper supervision over their children. "There are other provisions in the English act which tend to encourage individual responsibility. It is no use putting all the responsibility for errant children on the State. It is far better to compel parents to look after their own children. Nature never intended that anyone but the parents should look after their children, and any regulations that tend to lessen individual responsibility are to be deprecated. We all know in our own experience that any success we may have met with has been very largely due to the good upbringing influence of one's parents and the influence of a happy home of one's own. " Associates Thanked "This being the last time I shall be presiding in your Court, I want to thank you very much for the assistance you have always given me," Mr Wilson said. "Ours has been difficult work. At times it has been very difficult and very unpleasant, but somebody has to give up time trying to keep erring children on the right path and you have given up your pr:vafe time to this very good work. I think you deserve thanks for it and I know how close to your hearts it has been. "It has been very close to my heart, too because I know from my own experience in other Courts how many criminal careers are started in childhood. It is the effect of bad home influence, and sometimes of bad hereditary tendencies," he said. "This is the place where these influences may be guided and the tendency checked, and in that way the Children's Court is a Court of the utmost importance." Mr J C. Entrican, on behalf of Mr Wilson's associates, exoressed regret that the Court was no longer to have the benefit of his services, and mentioned the Court's aoprec ation of Mr Wilson's courtesy and cons deration.