Is the Big Problem Facing Kiwi Kids Poverty Or Parenting? Kiwis Say Parenting the Key Factor on Tv3’s the Vote

Child poverty has become a major issue for New Zealanders, but are are our kids suffering because of a lack of money or a lack of good parenting?

Tonight Kiwis voted Yes to the moot ‘Our kids: The problem’s not poverty, it’s parenting’ during national debate programme The Vote, which screened tonight on TV3.

Guyon Espiner and the Affirmative team were declared the winners of the debate at the end of the hour-long show with the votes tallied at 63% YES, 37% NO.

Viewers voted from around the country and overseas. During the broadcast #thevotenz trended at #1 in New Zealand on Twitter.

Viewer votes:

Facebook

Twitter Website Text TOTAL
61% YES

39% NO

65 YES

35% NO

57% YES

43% NO

64% YES

36% NO 63% YES

37% NO

The theatre audience voted before and after the debate. The results are:

Theatre audience vote – prior to debate

Theatre audience vote – end of debate
68% YES

22% NO

10% UNDECIDED 64% YES

32% NO

4% UNDECIDED

Dubbed ‘competitive current affairs’, The Vote sees co-hosts Duncan Garner and Guyon Espiner each month lead two teams to debate a hot topic, with Linda Clark keeping order as referee.

Tonight Guyon led a team arguing the problem is parents, not poverty. He was joined by Conservative Party CEO and former Families Commissioner Christine Rankin, Family First National Director Bob McCoskrie and Destiny Church co-founder Hannah Tamaki.

Duncan Garner headed a team arguing the problem is poverty, rather than parenting, with author and ex-prison manager Celia Lashlie, Commissioner for Children Dr Russell Wills and Mana Party leader Hone Harawira.

The arguments for:

• As a community we have to support families. I think we should be assessing how they’re getting their entitlement they’re entitled to and where is that money going because the problem is, for some families, the money comes straight in, it maybe goes to the relatives in the islands, it maybe goes to the loan shark, it maybe goes to the pokie machines, it maybe goes to whatever, but it’s not been prioritised and I think job description 101 for parents is a roof, shelter for your kids and food for your kids. – Bob McCoskrie
•
• I was raised in a single parent home and proudly to say by a man not a woman. My mother was a runaway mum; she only raised one of her 11 children. I know child abuse, I know lots of things but I had the most amazing father. I did not believe for one minute that I would not be a good mother. I actually think I’m a sensational mother and I’m an amazing grandmother to ten grandchildren. - Hannah Tamaki
•
• [Feeding children a bowl of cornflakes for breakfast costs] something like 37 cents per serve. And you know it is pathetic to say that families can’t do that. If their children are their first priority, they’re going to spend that 37 cents a day and put that food in their belly. – Christine Rankin
•
• I’d like to say that there are so many wonderful parents who have money and there amazing amount of parents who don’t have money. It’s about the love that you put into your children. - Hannah Tamaki
•
• Well why not help families budget? Instead of giving them fish, teach them how to fish. - Bob McCoskrie

The arguments against:

• I’ve worked for a long time in the business, I’ve met some hard, hard women and I’ve met a few women I’d like to put my boot firmly up their jacksie in terms of what they’re not doing. What I’ve never met and I mean, never, I’ve never met a woman who did not want to deliver better to her children than that which she has experienced and the conversation we’re having is belittling those women. - Celia Lashlie
•
• Where I come from I see kids being raised in cars, in vans, and some of my whanau here from Destiny know because they’ve come from those same places. I know this to be true, I see kids coming to school that are angry because other kids have got kai. I know kids who rummage through the rubbish on the way to school to get something to eat. You know this is not what we call a decent society. – Hone Harawira
•
• Look I’m a paediatrician, I work in child protection, I see kids who have got terrible behaviour and there are some parents who really struggle and don’t do a great job but more often, what I see is parents whose income is just too low and their outgoings, particularly on the cost of housing, are just too high. – Russell Wills
•
• What we need to understand, the real issue for us here tonight is that if we keep saying it’s bad parenting, it allows us to sanctimoniously pat ourselves on the back and say that’s nothing to do with us and it’s everything to do with us because they’re our children. - Celia Lashlie
•
• The fact of the matter is, that in stable society where people have jobs, people have homes to live in and children are getting something to eat you don’t get the level of family breakdown. You don’t get the level of family violence that you’re referring to. You’ve got it back to front. Poverty leads to family violence. Not the other way around. - Hone Harawira
•

The Vote is produced by TV3’s News and Current Affairs division with funding from NZ On Air, and screens once every four weeks in the same timeslot as 3rd Degree.

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