David Seymour is quickly finding the issue of Truancy is far more complex than just getting out the belt for a whipping.
Reactionary NuZilind is screaming for him to fine the parents of truant children but the ramifications of a puritan approach is a burning bridge too far even for Seymour.
Taking food out of hungry kids mouths he’s fine with, paying for a Truancy Stasi is a cost too great for someone focused only on amputation.
So after looking at the stats it’s sickness that has kept kids home.
This should surprise no one.
Post Covid we have all had weakened immune systems and the plague of sickness that has swamped us has resulted in far more kids staying at home.
The reality Seymour faces here is that the enormous true level of poverty in wider society is first harvested at school.
Forcing parents to send their sick kids to school so truancy rates fall WHILE removing free food from those very same schools is going to be fun to watch.
“I-don’t-care-if-you’re-sick-it’s-a-fine-for-truancy-or-Boot-Camp’ isn’t the aspirational message the Political Right seem to think it is.
There’s a difference between stoicism and being a fucking prick.
The polarised angry reactionary vote see truant kids as code for ‘Māori’ the same way they see ‘gang member’ as code for Māori, and they want the bejesus kicked out of these kids to sate their militant suburban vengeance fuelled by fears of crime.
The Right know the price of everything and the value of nothing.
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It is an unfortunate fact that there are substantial fractions of people in most Anglo societies who see the primary role of government not as achieving something positive for them and theirs, but in preventing other people they’ve decided they dislike from doing something that they enjoy.
Whether it’s left-liberals with nanny-state regulations on certain types of food or drinks rather than simply promoting healthier lifestyles in a positive manner, or the likes of Seymour with his weird nonce-state ideas, these people and their supporters need to get a grip.
“nanny-state regulations on certain types of food or drinks”
As opposed to allowing gods to regulate what you can eat and drink?
“This is not a ‘freedom’ we want or need.”
Which of your “freedoms” can we dispense with? You know ACT will.
Poverty and truancy go hand in hand . It’s a complex issue and no amount of hammering the parents with threats of traffic lights will fix it. On one hand we have truancy for school holidays by rich parents and on the other hand we have truancy because some parents are stuck in a cycle they can’t get out of and the children work to help pay the bills. This is a clueless policy we all know children need to be in school but unfortunately a big stick is not the answer.
The problem is with Labour there was no stick not for gangs not for poor tenants not for employers abusing their staff that is one reason they are not on office .zit is more because they were good at saving covid deaths
Trevor are you saying that National are here to protect staff from their employers? Really?
When it comes to crime there is no new stick Trevor. They will call something a stick but the problem is those sticks have been tried before. The gang patch thing might be new (if it actually happens) but who seriously believes the absence of a patch will stop crime. What’s worse is mungo doesn’t want to pay the person holding the “stick” very much which is a problem in itself. If you are too greedy and cheap to address underlying drivers of crime you better be prepared to pay your cops more.
Hell, forget situations where the kids are working. It’s all very well to say ‘you should know if your kids are in school’ when they’re the product of an intact marriage where the wife is able to work part time at most, and the husband is working a job where even he’s got enough flexibility to be able to take time off. Husband at the meatworks and mother working full time at the supermarket? Real life ‘single parents’ who don’t have a six-figure salary at some BS marketing job? Strange, not a lot of MPs and other ****s in the Wellington bubble emphasizing with those people.
Given that these same neoliberal pricks of NatLab have done their best to destroy social cohesion and economic stability to minimize the amount of people who enjoy the privilege of (at least by delegation) knowing where their kids are, they’re the last ones who should be trying to fine parents for what they’ve forced them into.
Billy Graham’s son did a good interview on the boot camps on RNZ he said it would be more effective to send these boys/ young men identified for boot camps individually to groups like there’s, so they are in positive environments making it harder for them to act up.
We have no government. We have no healthy, happy politic which eagerly keeps an eye out for people living with and within hardship. We have no gentle, intelligent and world-well-travelled caucus who’s life experiences give them the nuance to understand what it’s like to become down trodden then laid down in despair.
We have no intellect within our politics. We just have things in suits espousing animal cunning and will devour any and everything to sate their psychopathic narcissism.
Normally, I wouldn’t overly give a fuck but what’s happening is an ever grinding downward spirralling descent into where we’ll lose our country to local but mostly foreign money. We’re a deal that’s about to be closed and when that happens, you’ll see a whole new level of fucked.
The real reason why we have truancy born of poverty is because we have no literal politic. We just have us feeble lot barking on our leashes.
*WARNING* AUSTERITY
*WARNING* AUSTERITY
Before the election Luxon was on about ‘ASPIRATION’.
Everyone was going to be required to aspire to be like him. That was the only kind of ASPIRATION that mattered.
Bottom-feeders had no ASPIRATION which is why he was so contemptuous of them.
Now, it appears he and his little side-kick have come up against the people who say, we ASPIRE to have our children in school where they should be, but they get sick and while we wait for the official opinion on how sick they are, from official-type people, they will have to be absent, whether they improve in the meantime and could return to school, or not. So, while we would ASPIRE to have them in school, their return will be delayed because they haven’t been officially labelled as well.
Further, while we ASPIRE to ensure our children get a good education, we feel 10 days in Fiji would chase away the winter blues (it gets very damp in Epsom) and by the way we can get a cheaper fare if we go mid-week.
Furthermore, we think a trip to Perth to see Granny, will be educational in fact. They’ll learn more living out of a suitcase for a few days than they would staying at school till the bitter end.
Now, it turns out that people who ASPIRE to keep their children well or not passing on bugs to their friends and teachers are in fact bottom-feeders. They do their best for their families and don’t get to swan off on early holidays.
Luxon’s and Seymour’s definition of ASPIRATION is what they want it to be.
Little did they realize their idea of bottom-feeders are those who attend school regularly as they should, can’t afford overseas holidays, do what they are supposed to do even if it sometimes doesn’t go to plan.
Our definition of bottom-feeders are people like Luxon and Seymour who sneak around putting the knife in where they can, making money, get to know the ‘right’ people, doing dodgy deals, creating havoc which they can take advantage of and disloyally showing no concern for the ordinary people in NZ. They are there for the top-end bottom-feeders.
In conclusion, Luxon should leave big words to those who actually understand them or are willing to open a dictionary.
Seymour should leave actual real parents with real-life parenting experience however minimal, to decide whether their child is sick. If their child in fact needs to work to help support that family, Seymour ought to explain why he and Luxon have done nothing to relieve the child of that responsibility and allow them to return to school where they should be. All they have done is threaten and bully and show how completely inept and how unfit to govern, they both are.
They should both go and get real jobs.
Over some decades teaching there has been the political notions of confusing
” school” and “education ” as being the same concept.
On those ” unjustified ” absences , there has been justified absences from another point of view-:
Starting formal schooling and teaching to pass tests at too young an age.
Debilitating Dysmenorrhea
Bullying, feeling unsafe, fear
Being humiliated by the DP for incorrect shoes
Feeling whakama
Peer pressure
Headaches/ migraines
Low self esteem.
Negative classroom environment.
No busfares
No raincoat
Parent sick. Extended family dying.
One off important family event
Rigid and narrow teaching and learning styles.
Anxiety of failing
Underachievement of gifted kids
Lack of food
Poor support for special needs or disabilities.
Inadequate or out of date curriculum options at high school.
Westernised, monolithic ideology and testing not fit for future skills aquisition
Mental health
Victim of abuse or domestic violence.
Transient , insecure housing.
Late to school after the ‘half day’ cut off time for marking the roll twice daily.
The underlying issues are inadequately addressed by Little David’s traffic light system.
My belief – NEVER LET SCHOOL GET IN THE WAY OF A GREAT EDUCATION !
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2016/sep/20/grammar-schools-play-europe-top-education-system-finland-daycare
If they really cared about truancy and not actually punishment, which all studies show achieves nothing, then they would increase food in schools programmes to include breakfast and lunch. This is proven to increase attendance and stop truancy by encouraging hungry kids and poor parents. They wouldn’t stop or reduce food in schools programs. They should also bring back the murder house in every primary school so kids don’t get rotten teeth which make them sick, exhausted and in the worst cases unable to eat.
Truancy has increased. Education standards have fallen.
In the good old days 😉 in NZ if you were a kid out in the street during school hours you would come to the attention of police or truancy officer. Meanwhile if you hadn’t turned up at school the school would be making enquiries of the parents. When the kid returned to school after sickness a legit parental note would be required and if it didn’t look legit it would be checked with a phone call. If the note turned out to be false that would be fixed with a cane. Also employers and unions would not tolerate parents making under 16 kids work.
Things have changed.
Let’s hope there is no touching at these new boot camps and if so, who do we blame this time.
Oldest trick in the book,ring the school posing as a parent and say he or she is sick.
Why do we have people defending,supporting truancy?
Important message.
New Zealand on a voyage to great success,prosperity.
Responsible Government now in charge.
Very childish post. Nothing you post is supported by evidence. You are a nobody.
Surely you have some Lego house to build.
i wish luxton and his mob of dim lights would pull a sicky
I don’t blame Luxon, it’s the insular, unintelligent that elected him in.
They threw out the chum and now they have to go to sea just to be sick.
The bother of getting ordinary people to vote for rich-rule.
Absurdity, but cow-towing-to-the-rich Labour on the other side– cripes help us.
Musk just followed me on Twitter after I said ‘woke’ and attacks on free speech can’t compare to the much greater truths of threats against democracy and of climate change. I think he got the wrong end of the stick somehow, which he is liable to do. Blocked him. I suppose he’s following everyone to keep the dead whale above the surface.
‘Below’ the surface, friends.
Just wondering
Whose job is it to feed the kids for the other 12 weeks of the year?
Or they turn back to pig shit stupid over the school holidays.
If so do we need to set up food stations for them to wonder down to in the holes.
Usual story. These weirdos aren’t going to do shit. You’re 100% right when you call it revenge porn. For all the sickos like Rimmer, who take away an incentive for kids to go to school and then say they want kids to go to school… or what? Fucking revenge nerds are the biggest soft cocks and they love to punch down because they’re too scared to punch up
Not only are you a small farmer but your sicko comments suggest you also have a small brain.