Mazengarb Report

The cover page of the report.

The Mazengarb Report of 1954, formally titled the Report of the Special Committee on Moral Delinquency in Children and Adolescents, resulted from a ministerial inquiry (the Special Committee on Moral Delinquency in Children and Adolescents) sparked primarily by two infamous and well-publicised events in New Zealand's history: the 22 June 1954 Parker–Hulme murder case (subject of the 1994 Peter Jackson film Heavenly Creatures) and the 20 June 1954 "Petone incident". The report gained its name from the inquiry chairman, Queen's Counsel Ossie Mazengarb.

The committee, appointed on 23 July 1954, convened and operated rapidly — it reported on 20 September, barely 10 days after it completed hearing evidence, 59 days after its appointment, and 55 days after hearings began. Sociologically speaking, it exemplified a case of moral panic in New Zealand.

The Petone incident

On 20 June 1954, shortly after her mother and stepfather had reported her as missing, a 15½-year-old girl turned up at the local police station in the former Hutt Valley borough of Petone. The report details from page 11:[1]

She stated that, being unhappy at home with her stepfather, she had[…] been a member of what she called a "Milk Bar Gang", which […] met "mostly for sex purposes"; she […] was worried about the future of its younger members, and desired the police to break up the gang.

Shortly after, following a police round up of some of those named, a moral panic ensued in New Zealand, in which the above incident played no small part among several others, including a milk bar murder in Auckland (which resulted in one of the last executions in New Zealand.)

The enquiry

A review of New Zealand newspapers of the time reveals reports of "youths charged with indecent assault upon, or carnal knowledge of" underage females. Indeed, the enquiry's report notes this occurred "[in] the second week of July 1954".[1]

After an outbreak of moral panic among the public and in newspaper media, the Crown appointed the Special Committee on 23 July, and it started its work only four days later, on 27 July. With what some contemporary commentators considered unreasonable alacrity, the Committee began hearing evidence on 3 August in Wellington, completing its hearings in Auckland on 10 September. Barely ten days later, on 20 September, the Committee had reported; Hansard records that the responsible cabinet minister had already sent the report to the Government Printer for printing before its actual tabling in Parliament.

Unusually for an enquiry report of that era, the report became, one of the biggest jobs for the Government Printer at the time. It was noted that postal staff complained of the weight when carrying out another unusual task: distributing copies of the report to every household in the country.[2]

Conclusions and recommendations

The report came up with 27 conclusions and about 20 recommendations.

Conclusions

Among the conclusions, in summary:[1]

Recommendations

The recommendations covered legislative proposals, administrative suggestions and even "parental example". Highlights included:[1]

Follow-up

The cover page of the follow up Report of Juvenile Delinquency Committee (AJHR 1955, I-15).

Parliament responded to the Mazengarb Report with a special select committee appointed on September 28, 1954. Its report (AJHR 1955, I-15) was due to be issued on October 1, 1955.

References

  1. 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 Mazengarb, Oswald (1954), Report of the Special Committee on Moral Delinquency in Children and Adolescents, New Zealand Government, pp. 63–68, H-47
  2. Yska, Redmer (1993). All shook up : the flash bodgie and the rise of the New Zealand teenager in the fifties. Auckland, N.Z.: Penguin Books. ISBN 9780140169997.

Further reading

External links