Wong Pansy: Education (Export Education Levy) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Wong Pansy: Education (Export Education Levy) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:619;Page:14747] 
PANSY WONG (National) 
: 
 The Education (Export Education Levy) Amendment Bill is the title of this bill but I believe that it does not convey the substance of the bill. When the export education levy was first established it was clear that the purposes that the fund or levy could be put to were to develop and promote quality assurance in the export education sector. Those purposes may include professional development marketing the implementation of scholarships research resource development and support or they may relate to other bodies engaged in the development the administration and the audit of the co-care or pastoral care of students and the general administration of the levy and associated purposes. 
The title of this bill is not very informative to the public. In fact the Government proposes to increase one category of levy and that particular levy will be charged to private education providers only. It will not be a levy imposed on the whole export education sector. That levy will be restricted to the private providers of the export education levy and it will then be used to reimburse students’ fees or accommodation expenses and other expenses in cases where private education providers fail. We were told that was to be so whether the reimbursement was first paid out by ministries or departments—by the Crown. 
All the submitters to the Education and Science Committee were unanimously against that. I could not summarise the opposition to the increased levy better than by referring to the submission made by the Association of Private Providers of English Language. Its representatives believed that the real priority if the Labour Government was trying to give protection to students’ fees paid in advance would not be achieved by punishing private education providers but by improving enforcement. Those providers told us that if they believed that this bill would have an impact only every few years—that is if the New Zealand Qualifications Authority did its monitoring job properly and institutions that had not adhered to the proper guidelines were put on notice and had effective action taken against them—then they might not be hesitant to support this particular additional levy. But the fact is that in the last 10 months there were not one and not two but three major collapses of private educational institutions and in all of those collapses according to those providers questions can be raised about the enforcement or lack of enforcement by the New Zealand Qualifications Authority. 
 When the private export education providers have no confidence in the enforcement agency or gatekeeper doing its job then the export education additional levy that is to be charged on them will not be fair. The title “Education (Export Education Levy) Amendment Bill” should be a bit more— 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: This is not the title debate. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: Part 1. 
PANSY WONG 
: We still believe that the title is not informative. However in terms of the substance of the bill it has been pointed out by private providers that if the gatekeeper the New Zealand Qualifications Authority had done its job when people informed it that certain institutions had not adhered to the guidelines or if it had used a robust auditing procedure then some of the earlier high-profile collapses could have been prevented.