Physically, he needs to be protected from ill-treatment and from excessive corporal punishment. Emotionally he needs to live a life which is not repressive but which will permit the full and free development of his personality as an individual, with individual feelings which he must be entitled to express in order to have maturity of judgment. He needs exposure to a wide not a confined range of experiences in life. His educational needs are that those who teach him provide him with the information and the encouragement to attain the full flowering of his intellectual potential. A full education is the birthright of every child. I gratefully adopt the submission of the amicus curiae that:
"As an essential part of the upbringing of any child, in attempting to educate it, and impart to it a balanced moral and ethical code, the fostering of a capacity in the child to make a discriminating choice in the conduct of his or her own affairs is, at its lowest, desirable."
I go further. It is not only desirable - it is necessary.
Generally, this boy needs to be brought up by his mother. If she is capable of doing so, he will need much positive contact with his grandmother. In the circumstances of this case, that contact is to be frequent enough and long enough to sustain and build their relationship both in order that she, the grandmother, may monitor his progress, but also that he, the child, may know he has a haven of safety to which he may retreat if ever he finds life in The Family uncomfortable. Likewise, and as essentially, if he is to make his home with his grandmother, he will need to continue to see his mother to preserve and maintain that relationship for its own sake and for her again assuming the reins of control should she ever withdraw from The Family.
