Power Simon: Motions — Southern Institute of Technology—Ombudsman's Recommendations 
Power Simon: Motions — Southern Institute of Technology—Ombudsman's Recommendations 
[Volume:619;Page:15086] 
SIMON POWER (National—Rangitikei) 
: 
 This is a very serious matter and in my short time of nearly 5 years in this Parliament it is an issue that when members read in detail the report of the Ombudsman raises a series of issues relating to tertiary institutions which frankly go well beyond the situation at the Southern Institute of Technology that Mr Peck referred to. That was a very odd situation indeed where students wishing to gain a diploma as a qualification were required to complete 2 years of study successfully with the first year being the certificate programme. They then found themselves in a situation where they were unable to complete the second year of that programme and had to leave with just the certificate and presumably without the opportunity to complete the diploma. 
Now the Ombudsman’s report interestingly says that prima facie the qualification those students undertook—the certificate—was of itself a qualification for which they were enrolled as a stand-alone qualification but the impication that the students made very clearly as part of the case they put was that it was always their intention to go on as part of the 2-year programme and complete the diploma qualification. As Mr Peck rightly said those students attempted to exercise their rights by way of application to the High Court. As that point—I think I am right in saying this—the Master at the first instance advised the students that their chances of success in the application were shall we say limited at the least. 
So the students sought recourse to the Ombudsman which again in itself is an odd course of action to take. It is a very odd course to take because from my limited experience in law I would say that one would ordinarily only in very limited circumstances have recourse to the Ombudsman when legal remedies that were available did not meet the outcome one desired. The Ombudsman to my way of thinking is more usually responsible for legislative and public sector indiscretions or for looking for rulings of fairness and equity rather than dealing with specific legal issues. So in that sense the report is quite extraordinary. 
But the issue that Mr Peck raises should not be seen in isolation to the Southern Institute of Technology because the bigger questions that must be asked as part of Mr Peck’s motion are: where were the New Zealand Qualifications Authority and the Tertiary Education Commission and what were those two organisations doing in the background as those types of issues arose? Now the New Zealand Qualifications Authority in my view should have been far more on top of that issue from the beginning. I guess that the one thing we on this side of the House would say is that in difficult situations like this Parliament is on balance probably obligated to support the Officer of Parliament who has made the finding as the Ombudsman had in this case. 
 That does not necessarily mean that the Southern Institute of Technology got it wrong in the eyes of everybody but it does mean that in the end Parliament has to make a decision as to whether it will back the parliamentary-appointed position of the Ombudsman or the institution. I have to say that regardless of whether members agree with the preliminary view of the Ombudsman contained on page 9 of the report the one thing that caught my eye as I read the report earlier today was the sentence the Ombudsman inserted into his report under paragraph 8 on page 9 which was his final view. At that point the Ombudsman felt compelled to say this: “The institute did not respond to my preliminary opinion as I had invited and consequently I confirmed it as my final opinion.” 
One would have thought that the Southern Institute of Technology was very clearly given the opportunity to respond to the Ombudsman’s preliminary view but it did not take that opportunity and I guess the only word to describe that particular course of action or inaction is “unfortunate”. I think it is unfortunate that the Ombudsman was unable to offer up to the reader of the report the Southern Institute of Technology’s response to his preliminary view. As I read through the report I thought that was a bit of a glaring gap. 
So I guess the question then becomes what type of move if any will the Government take from here? The penultimate paragraph of the report states: “The Prime Minister has commented that it is of serious concern to her and the Government that the Southern Institute of Technology has declined to accept my”—that is the Ombudsman’s—“recommendation.” The report goes on to state: “She has asked that I and the Associate Minister of Education (Tertiary) meet to discuss how better protection can be given to students in cases such as this.” 
Now the question for this Parliament is what will the Government do to follow the advice of the Ombudsman in this particular set of circumstances because the Prime Minister also said in those final paragraphs that neither she nor her Ministers were empowered to direct the Southern Institute of Technology in matters of this kind? That may well be the case but does it solve the problem in the long run? So this is not a particularly pleasant motion to be speaking to but it is an important motion for members to have a view on and that is the reason the National Party allowed leave for this matter to be debated in the first instance.