An act of regression

On October 22, Education Minister Nurul Islam Nahid said in an address at Jagannath University: “A nation cannot progress by harming its future generation.” Two days later, his colleagues in parliament passed the Parents’ Care Bill.  In his speech, the minister was referring to the detrimental impact of political street violence on the HSC success rate this year; hartals have forced the education authorities to shift the timetables of more than 30 HSC exams. His words ring hollow, however, when you consider what the lawmakers did next.    The Parents’ Care Act obliges children to take responsibility for their elders at home, or else provide them with at least 10% of their incomes if they no longer live together. Siblings can in no way force their parents into old people’s homes, and they must guarantee all of their basic necessities. Not only that, children whose parents have passed away are now duty bound to maintain the surviving grandparents. A failure to comply could result in their financial punishment, or even imprisonment. Mercifully, the approval of private members’ bills is uncommon in the political system here. Before the Awami-League-led ninth Parliament enacted this one and two others last month, only seven such laws had been passed since 1973. And with good reason. Any backbench member can table a draft paper in the Parliament, so they are often so subjective; they lack any potential for achieving broad-based support.    First proposed by Jatiya Party MP Mujibul Haque in 2011, the Parent’s Care Bill only received the endorsement of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina after two years of behind the scenes lobbying and revisions. Similar to most others, however, the bill should have been rejected long before it reached the statute book.   The age of majority In developed countries, traditional family values place children in the care of their parents from the point of birth to the onset of adulthood. Most countries enshrine this “age of majority” in law, thereby terminating the legal control and responsibilities of parents or guardians over, and for, their dependents, usually at 18.    For parents, adulthood marks the symbolic point at which their child should spread his or her wings, and fly the nest. For the new adult, the liquid excesses of an 18th birthday party are often washed down with a sobering realisation that they may no longer rely on handouts from home. Rent may now be due, and an honest living expected to be earned. If continuing in education, the college fund will begin to shrink alarmingly. At this watershed moment in their lives, children must learn to stand on their own two feet.    Despite the shock to all systems, there is at least an understanding common among parents, guardians and children that the starting line of adult life is reached with the new runners in the best possible shape. In conservative theory at least, they are given the perfect platform to build a career, find a spouse and settle down, at which point the cycle is repeated.    The wage of minors In developing countries, the opposite scenario is true. Here, children are put to work as soon as they are physically able to contribute, particularly in poorer and rural areas, and often at the expense of their educations. The emphasis is on short-term acquisition, rather than longer term development leading to prosperity. As such the child supports the family, rather than the family providing for the child’s every want and need.    Michael McGrath, the country director for Bangladesh at Save the Children, said in a recent interview with the UK Guardian newspaper, he said the current stage of development of this country means children contribute a substantial percentage of the income of poor families, but are neglected in return.    “Employers just don’t consider (their) welfare,” he said, “They think they are doing a good thing; the parents send the children and they get food and a warm place to stay. We say it’s not enough, they need to treat them with dignity and educate them.” There are 7.4 million working children aged between five and 17 in Bangladesh. According to Save the Children, 80% of these are employed in non-formal settings such as private homes, where it is extremely difficult to monitor conditions and experiences. “We tell (employers) they will get more out of the kids if they have breaks for education and leisure time,” McGrath said.   In the language of development, it is over-simplistic to talk only of breaking cycles, such as those driving poverty, corruption, and domestic violence. In Bangladesh, the cycle of parent-child dependency needs first to be interrupted, and then reversed, because every penny spent by adult children on maintaining their parents, is one less penny they can spend on raising and educating their own children. More than that, if parents know their children will be legally required to provide for them as they enter old age, does that not encourage them to have even more children?   Rights and wrongs Ageing populations are increasing fiscal demands on national exchequers worldwide, especially for income support, health and social services. In Bangladesh, this is a problem the current, next and all future governments simply cannot afford. But by shifting responsibility from the state to the child, instead of from the state to the individual, the country is entrapping its next generation at precisely the time when it should be empowering them. By following this path, the politicians have condemned the people to relative poverty in perpetuity, only the people don’t know it yet.    Justifying his Parent’s Care Bill, Mujibul Haque MP said Bangladesh’s changing society now promoted the nucleus family, which left old parents and grandparents helpless and forced many into care homes, while their children “lived lavish lives.”    “I do understand that parents will not file cases against their children, but the symbolic law will ensure the rights of the parents,” he said on October 24, the day the bill was passed.   Never mind the rights of the parents, what about those of the children? Bangladesh should be moving laws to safeguard its future generation, reinforce their rights, and reverse the cycle of dependency. Instead, it passed this wretched bill of wrongs, in the ultimate act of regression.