Katene Rahui: Education Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
Katene Rahui: Education Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
[Volume:662;Page:10866] 
RAHUI KATENE (Maori Party—Te Tai Tonga) 
: 
 I am pleased to take a call on the third reading of the Education Amendment Bill. In many respects this is a catch-up bill which addresses some legislative loopholes and policy glitches that have arisen from a host of issues raised in the last few years. It is also an opportunity to update certain outdated provisions. In its scope the bill provides the means to deal with unregistered teachers incompetent boards or issues impacting on the safety and well-being of students. 
The Maori Party has a keen interest in addressing educational participation and performance and as such supports any initiatives that seek to raise a school’s expectations about the achievements of all of its students. Our focus has been on a range of other measures such as promoting whanau engagement reducing teacher-student ratios increasing professional development for teachers—particularly in cultural competency—and in giving the opportunity to incentivise and reward schools that reduce underachievement and disengagement. In that context the chance both to improve the safety of children and to reduce compliance costs for schools is something that we fully support. We also support any initiatives that create improvements in respect of the well-being and education of students. 
The focus of this bill with regard to the suitability of teachers or other staff for employment in a school is an important one. We are also pleased that increased scrutiny has been introduced to ensure that non-teaching staff will be vetted before they have unsupervised access to children. These are important safeguards to keep our children safe. 
But I want to digress and share with this House a wonderful initiative as a way of providing a broader context in which to consider this bill. This year a Maori immersion class is being piloted at Dunedin North Intermediate at the southern end of the Te Tai Tonga electorate. The class Ka Puanani o te Reo meets on Tuesdays with one teacher and a resource teacher of Maori to provide an integrated programme around language development reading writing art activities and music. The distinctive feature of this class is that it is a unique initiative in partnership with whanau schools Ngai Tahu and the Ministry of Education. But the spirit of cooperation extends even further reaching out to welcome students from schools right across the Dunedin community. 
I wanted to share that initiative because it is an example of schools with a deep commitment to the best interests of their students. It is a model of schools working together. It is a model where success and achievement are intimately linked in the effective participation of all students. So often in this House we focus on failure and flaws rather than on breeding success. It is perhaps timely to consider that in the context of this bill which tidies up areas of neglect in the current legislation. 
Notwithstanding that I acknowledge that the changes made in this bill are made in response to concerns raised by schools early childhood education services contractors and commentators such as the Children’s Commissioner. We welcome the moves to improve the safety of children and to reduce compliance costs for schools. We understand that the amendments specifically to do with police vetting have been tested internationally in the United States England Canada and Australia and have been found to provide an effective safeguard for child safety. It is however disappointing to note that although the amendments were discussed with a wide range of education sector organisations—such as the School Trustees Association the Principals Federation the Secondary Principals’ Association the Post Primary Teachers Association the New Zealand Educational Institute and the early childhood advisory committee—there were two notable omissions from the consultation process: Te Kohanga Reo National Trust and Te Runanganui o nga Kura Kaupapa Maori o Aotearoa. Legislative changes that impact positively on the well-being and education of students including those about the suitability of teachers or other staff for employment at a school are of utmost importance to all schools and that includes schools in Maori immersion settings. 
Finally I support the intention of the bill to promote an expectation that registered teachers will be teaching and that responsible people will be working in close proximity to children. The Maori Party is happy to support this bill.