Fenton Darien: General Debate 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Fenton Darien: General Debate 
[Sitting date: 22 August 2012. Volume:683;Page:4645. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
DARIEN FENTON (Labour) 
: 
 We on this side of the House are enormously proud of our public education system. It has a wonderfully high standard that is recognised internationally and it is something to be celebrated not dumped on like this National Government is doing. We need to celebrate the fact that we have good teachers and staff in our schools in our early childhood centres and in our institutions and universities. But one of the saddest things I have heard in the last couple of weeks was at the meeting of educationalists and teachers who told me that they are losing the passion for teaching because of the dumping that is going on from this Government the madness that has descended from this Government that we have seen through most of the year. 
First of all it was the class sizes debacle. Of course the Government thought the parents would not notice that because it was having a go at the teachers and it thought that the parents would side with it on that. Well of course parents did notice and they made a big fuss about it and the Government was forced to back down. Then we had league tables and we have still got league tables—another part of the madness that has descended on the education system from this Government. And now thanks to a cup of tea and a pretty dirty deal we have got the latest madness which is charter schools—or am I supposed to call them partnership schools now? They are charter schools which no— 
Hon Annette King 
: John Banks’ folly. 
DARIEN FENTON 
: John Banks’ folly. Schools that no one wants no one needs except the deluded members of the ACT Party. I was interested to go back and have a look at what happened and what the ACT Party said when it launched its policy. It was poor poor old Dr Don Brash who launched it. 
Hon Annette King 
: The old hapless dried arrangement. 
DARIEN FENTON 
: The hapless Don Brash who launched the policy for charter schools at a school that is in the area in which I work as an MP in Browns Bay the Corelli performing arts school. In his speech he compared our education system to McDonald’s. He compared it to McDonald’s. He said: “If the education system was the restaurant industry these”—talking about private schools like Corelli—“would be the specialist suburban eateries faithfully serving their unique local markets. The rest of the education system would be McDonald’s serving the same stuff consistently across every location. The head office being the Ministry of Education sets the menu … the performance standards being the exams the décor being the bricks and mortar of the school the pay rates being the national teacher pay scale and the way customers are served being the teaching style.” 
So what he was telling us in that speech is that the 97 percent of kids who go to State schools deserve nothing more than McDonald’s and that actually the 3 percent who go to private schools are going to get a lot better than that. Try telling my kids who actually have a master’s degree and doctorates now that because they went to State institutions they have been let down. Well actually the only thing that has let them down is the fact that there are no decent job opportunities for talented young people in New Zealand. They have left along with the landslide of other Kiwis who we are seeing heading to the other side of the world for better work and better wages. They ain’t coming home any time soon. 
David Selfe the principal of the Corelli Academic School of Arts addressed the ACT Party conference before the last election praising the setting up of the charter schools. There is a very close link with Corelli so I thought I would tell the House a little bit about what is going on. It claims to be the only charter school in New Zealand and it charges around $18000 per year for senior students. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: How much? 
DARIEN FENTON 
: Eighteen thousand dollars per year. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: Is that boarding? 
DARIEN FENTON 
: It is in Browns Bay too. It is not boarding. It is for performing arts. It is in Browns Bay so it is not in South Auckland or Christchurch where the poorer kids are like ACT says it wants to be. But the interesting thing about Corelli is that it is now taking a large number of its own parents to court. They are taking them to court for allegedly breaking their scholarships. These kids— 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: So the kids are leaving? 
DARIEN FENTON 
: The kids are leaving and they are getting sued. The parents are being sued. The kids went to school to get an education to gain university entrance and to further their talents in the performing arts which is what this school is supposed to be about. But they did not get the education that they were expecting. Some of them found they were not on track to get qualifications they signed up for. The subjects they were expecting to do were cancelled. Qualifications were not offered in their place they were not up to university entrance standards and there were not enough classes being offered. So parents pulled their kids out of the school and they have had to take them elsewhere to get their education. 
One of the parents has told me that their child is now a year behind in her schooling. She has to catch up with her peers. Her parents are being sued. What an advertisement from the poster child of the charter schools model. 
The debate having concluded the motion lapsed.