Criminal responsibility at age 10?

Press, 4 August 1987, Page 5

Criminal responsibility at age 10?

Children who commit crimes at the age of 10 understand what they are doing and should be held criminally responsible, says a retired Christchurch social worker. “I believe it is time we realised that children have criminal Inclinations at 10,” said Mr Doug Seller. Mr Seller retired from the Social Welfare Department for the fourth time on Friday. Although his official retirement was in November, 1985, he had been asked to return for relieving work three times.

He disagreed with the Children and Young Persons Act, 1974, which changed the age of criminal responsibility from 10 years to 14 years. It a child aged 10 appeared before the Court, Mr Seller said a programme could be initiated to help the child. By the age of 14, “they pretty much know the course they want to follow.” “The bleeding heart brigade” had been prominent in bringing about the law change, he said. They did not realise that the department was often dealing with “little thugs,” not “poor chib dren.” “Until the Government, in particular, bites the bullet and gets its preventative programme further upstream, it is never going to solve the problem.”

Mr Seller said that sometimes the department was dealing with pre-schoolers who had committed crimes. He recalled one case of two pre-schoolers and one older child involved in an arson.

He was particularly disturbed by the more vio-

lent type of crimes committed by young people today. Twenty years ago he was threatened by a “guy” who told him the next time he saw him it would be down the sights of a .303 rifle. “I just laughed at him then. Today I would take it seriously.” Mr Seller had completed 42 years of public service when he retired in 1985. Thirty-three years of that was spent as a child welfare officer for the Education Department and later as a social

worker for the Social Welfare Department. His last full-time position was deputy assistant director of social work in Christchurch. After more than 30 years working with children Mr Seller said he was upset by Governments that were “all talk and no do.” Preventative work was always talked about but little was done. The department's social workers were too busy reacting to crises to devote time to prevention. “Social workers are

looking at their priorities because they are overcommitted,” he said. They were “being asked to do more and more with less and less.” A “rapid increase” in the number of clerical workers was needed to release professional staff who were too busy with paper work. A public inquiry into the work of the department and total restructuring was also needed, said Mr Seller. During his time work-

ing with children, Mr Seller said he saw his biggest achievement as the idea of establishing the Eastling Parent Craft Centre, in Eastling Street. He fought hard to get approval for the centre which worked with families in an intensive threeweek period to achievespecific goals. The centre had a high success rate. Mr Seller also established the voluntary social worker system in 1975 to complement the department’s work.

In recent years he had tried several times to get approval for another scheme which targeted children at risk at intermediate school. All the planning for an intermediate treatment centre has been done. When it was first suggested in the early 1980 s the idea was dismissed as “too innovative,” he said. It aimed to bring children at risk of being offenders into the centre for specialist day help while they were still at intermediate school. .