Hutchison Paul: Education (Tertiary Reforms) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Hutchison Paul: Education (Tertiary Reforms) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:643;Page:13185] 
Dr PAUL HUTCHISON (National—Port Waikato) 
: 
 Part 2 deals with related amendments to other enactments of the very important Education (Tertiary Reforms) Amendment Bill. When speaking on Part 1 I stated its importance. Part 2 is equally very important as is the whole bill because it is so pivotal to New Zealand’s future economic growth and productivity—the productivity that has been so sadly lacking under the Labour Government over the last 7 years. 
It is good to see the Hon Steve Maharey here in the Chamber this afternoon because in many respects this bill has been brought about by the failure of the continuous reform that has gone on over the last 7 years. In fact the OECD in its report this year said that on average reforms have occurred in tertiary education in New Zealand every 2 years. It has been calculated that just the bureaucratic costs of the reforms has been in the order of $419 million— 
Colin King 
: How much? 
Dr PAUL HUTCHISON 
: From the budgetary estimates it is $419 million. And here we are again with more reforms. Mr Maharey is off to Massey and he has left Dr Cullen and now the Hon Peter Hodgson to take over. But in the meantime that $419 million has gone to waste when it should have gone into education. 
It is quite interesting that clause 44(1) repeals the definition of profiles. After all profiles and charters were brought in by the Hon Steve Maharey during those turbulent years that resulted in soft courses and a huge extra wastage of money—over and above the bureaucratic wastage—which has amounted to about a billion dollars over the last 7 years. But it is interesting to recall just what the Hon Steve Maharey said about the reforms back in 2002. He said that “These reforms represent the culmination of the government’s promise to overhaul our tertiary education and training systems.” 
So there we were back in 2002 when those reforms were the “culmination of the government’s promise”. But here we are again: one more reform; another reform—what has happened to them? What did he say in 2003? He said: “The TEC will bring clear strategic direction to the system as a whole.” But we all know that the whole system has been mired down in a fog worse than those at Wellington Airport. 
Extraordinarily in 2005 the vice-chancellor of Victoria University wrote to Minister Maharey to proclaim that “The system is haemorrhaging dollars right before your very eyes.” That is how bad the legacy has been and that is why Dr Cullen was called in to bring in the latest reforms which we have here in Part 2. 
As I said the charters and profiles have been taken away. They were instituted by the grand architect over there Steve Maharey but have been dispensed with by the new investment plan the grand new investment plan that is supposed to be introduced every 3 years. But in actual fact if we look at the wording of this bill more closely we see that it looks as if the Tertiary Education Commission has the Draconian power not only to insist on a 3-year investment plan but to require institutions to have a short-term plan a medium-term plan and a long-term plan. 
But I will stick strictly to Part 2 of the bill because it deals with industry training organisations. There were some good submissions particularly from Competenz which submitted that the bill legitimises existing implementation tools. However it said that the Tertiary Education Commission’s decisions were negating the intent of those tools. 
Competenz contended that the tertiary education strategy and the investment guidance required industry training organisations to develop more qualifications at levels 5 to 7 of the national qualifications framework to ensure that training took place. However the Tertiary Education Commission’s cap on industry training organisation funding at levels 5 and above constrained its ability to meet this requirement. 
Those are the sorts of topsy-turvy things that the Government has done. On the one hand it has said that it wants organisations to offer higher-level training but on the other hand it is bringing in these caps which will make it more difficult. 
Just to conclude it is important to say that this bill was supposed to be about quality value for money and relevance. Yet we have a situation with Modern Apprenticeships. I am sure my colleague Colin King who is an expert on them will expand a little further on this aspect. Modern Apprenticeships were supposed to be the great new thing of the Labour Government but we know now that the scheme’s completion rate is abysmally low. The Labour Government has lauded the scheme as being the grand new thing yet we know that back in 1992 the industry training organisations had to come in. The old apprenticeships system was a shambles. We needed to modernise training within industry and that was done very well by the National Government of the time. 
Over the last 7 to 8 years the Labour Government has poured millions of dollars into its so-called flagship Modern Apprenticeships scheme only to find that an abysmally low number of apprentices have actually completed the courses.