Blackman urges parents to enforce court conditions for children

Parents need to ensure that children who come into conflict with the law comply with court orders, Minister of Education Transformation Chad Blackman has warned, saying that too many are not receiving the support needed to correct their behaviour.

During Tuesday’s House of Assembly debate on the Penal System Reform (Amendment) Bill, which seeks to give judges greater flexibility to consider relevant previous convictions, Blackman said too many parents were failing to enforce court instructions intended to help students correct their behaviour.

“It is one of the reasons why I have made it very clear that there must be a strong, very strong role of parents and families in the effort of ensuring that students do the right thing,” he said.

“There are a number of students who go into the court system, and often when there is strict instruction given as to what a student must do as part of helping them to correct their wrongs, we are still seeing too many parents not enforcing and helping to enforce what the court has asked to be done.”

Blackman urged parents to take the issue seriously, saying they should act “in the interest of your child”.

He also pointed to drug use among young people as another challenge facing the education system, saying the Ministry of Education Transformation was working with the National Council on Substance Abuse (NCSA) and others to address the issue.

“From time to time, you will find a student or students, male or female, who believe that they can push the envelope further and further and further,” Blackman said.

He said that while government provided education, students who deliberately tested the system by failing to attend school or focus on their studies created challenges requiring intervention beyond the classroom.

“We have to work not just with practitioners in education, but of course we are struggling with issues throughout the years, decades and decades with issues with respect to drug use.”

Blackman said the ministry had recently engaged the NCSA and committed to further discussions on the issue.

“One of the things that we are confronting as a country is the issue of addressing drug use by our students and the wider population.”

He warned of the impact drug use could have on young people’s development and health, noting that the concern extended beyond marijuana to other substances.

Blackman also blamed social media and the Internet for exposing young people to content that could influence their behaviour: “The impact that it has on the minds of our young people, particularly at a time when you’re trying to not just learn, but to grasp new concepts, and then the effects that it has on health.

“With the exposure from these things called smartphone and the Internet and TikTok, and the glamorisation of a lot of things even outside of this jurisdiction that are influencing the behaviour of a lot of the things that our young people are doing in society, far less in school.”

Turning to school discipline, Blackman said students should not view school as a place to follow fashion trends. He also urged students to wear their socks at the appropriate height and keep their hair well groomed.

“School, as I said, is not a place for fashion. It’s a place of focus and discipline.” (SB)