Minister of Education Andrew Holness told guests at a closing ceremony for the Bernard Van Leer Foundation Inner-city Child Support Project that the Government acknowledges that the family, and relationships between adults and minors over whom they have care and control, can be deemed 'private domain'.
However, he noted, "While Government does not wish to instruct parents on how to bring up their children, the current situation shows the significant failure of parenting is having a negative effect on the wider society."
Poor parenting
Holness said poor parenting is manifesting itself in children who are not socially well adjusted, who leave the private domain of the home and misbehave at school and in public, who are prone to crime and violence, misuse public facilities and have no appreciation for the natural environment.
Often too, he said, some in the creative and cultural industry "create things which are offensive to our sensibilities". Against this background the minister said "Government can't stand by and do nothing as there is a significant social cost for parenting failure".
Lauding the Van Leer Foundation for the Inner-city Child Support Project which has trained more than 150 parents and early-childhood caregivers, and was designed to improve care and protection of children ages 0-6 years, Holness said parenting is part of a cycle rooted in culture and history and so, in trying to correct Jamaica's problems, enforce-ment cannot be the first strategy.
"The first strategy must be education so that parents can be introspective about their behaviour and reform achieved," he said.