Academic’s Research Wins Top Prize at Law Teachers Conference

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UKZN Law academic Ms Willene Holness won the First Presenters’ Prize at the Society of Law Teachers of Southern Africa Conference hosted by the University of the Witwatersrand.

Holness’s winning paper was titled: “Unfit mothers: the Need for Law reform to Address the Removal of Children from Parents with Intellectual Disabilities in SA”.

The prize is presented annually to a law teacher presenting at the Conference for the first time.

The Conference gives South African legal education specialists access to both emerging and established law academics providing an opportunity to exchange ideas and research findings.

Holness’s paper was based on a literature review of the phenomenon of child removal from parents with intellectual disabilities following allegations of neglect.  It was a comparative study, looking at empirical studies predominantly in Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States, and provided an analysis of relevant provisions in the South African Children’s Act of 2005 with regard to parents with disabilities and their children. 

‘I analysed factors which place parents at risk of having their children removed from them on the basis of their intellectual disability.

‘These factors are: legal capacity, stereotypes of their parenting adequacy, lack of support from social services and lack of information about their legal rights, and lastly cumulative stressors such as poverty and poor mental and physical health.

‘The competition was fierce and I feel honoured to have been awarded the prize. The support of my colleagues in attendance at the Conference elevated the experience even further,’ said Holness.

Holness aims to further her research into this area as there is very little statistical data or empirical studies in South Africa and to complete her Doctors of Law degree.

- Thandiwe Jumo