Robertson Grant: Education (Freedom of Association) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Robertson Grant: Education (Freedom of Association) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:671;Page:17584] 
GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central) 
: 
 I am pleased to take my first call on clause 4A. I will carry on from where my colleague Iain Lees-Galloway in his impromptu address just finished. There is both good and bad in what is happening here with clause 4A. The good is that the Education and Science Committee recognised that there was now a gap in relation to student representation on councils. The select committee realised that there needed to be a specific clause that would continue to facilitate students being represented on councils. So in that sense it is a good thing that the select committee has brought forward this issue. However the solution proposed in clause 4A cuts to the heart of the problem of the whole bill—that is the loss of student control of student affairs. We have been over this issue a number of times in the earlier readings in this debate. At the heart of one of the major objections that this side of the Chamber has to this bill is the fact that students who for generations now have had some control of the way in which affairs are administered at the institution they are studying at are losing that control. We will come to the next clause in the bill later in which we will talk about how that plays out in terms of the collection of fees and so on. 
This clause is about something quite fundamental: the representation of students on tertiary institution councils. It is a vital role about which the select committee heard that institutional representatives really value having on tertiary councils students who can represent student views and who they know have been through some process themselves of being elected. Those students are there on a representative basis to provide a voice and a feedback mechanism for those institutions. 
I remember visiting the Nelson Marlborough Institute of Technology last year and the chief executive there made it really clear to me that on a number of decisions made by the council having duly elected students on that council made a difference and made for better decisions. That is particularly the case as Iain Lees-Galloway was just mentioning before in terms of multiple-campus environments. The Nelson Marlborough Institute of Technology is an example. It is not as big as Massey University obviously but it is an institution with a multiple-campus environment and those student representatives who have a role across those different campuses add something to the tertiary council that those who perhaps represent a particular geographic area in terms of the wider council membership cannot do. 
The amendment in my name to clause 4A is an attempt to say yes I thank the select committee for having put this up but clause 4A as agreed to by the committee does not bring this issue of representation into the control of students. Once again the clause does what this bill does throughout: it takes away from students the ability to manage their own affairs and hands that over to an institution. The institution may or may not have the best interests of the students at heart and it may or may not come up with a truly democratic process for the selection of students to represent the wider student body. But we know that student associations where they exist can run that process and that students elected to a council can be truly legitimate representatives of the students at that institution. The amendment I have put forward acknowledges the situation that we obviously do not want to occur but is a likely outcome of Heather Roy’s bill—that is that there will not be student associations for some campuses. That will be the outcome and the member sponsoring the bill needs to acknowledge that. 
Hon Heather Roy 
: There aren’t now. 
GRANT ROBERTSON 
: I think there are one or two I tell Heather Roy. I think she will find that under this bill there will be a whole lot more institutions where students do not have student associations. My amendment however acknowledges that sad reality in subparagraph (i): “following an election (conducted in accordance with statutes made by council) by the students at the association where no student association exists at the institution;”. But where a student association is in existence it should be the body that elects those students to tertiary institution councils. I served as a student on a tertiary institution council for 2 years and I think that the student voice is an important voice that should not be lost. 
Shane Ardern 
: And what’s changed since 1960? 
GRANT ROBERTSON 
: Oh a harsh man! It was in 1993 and 1994 actually—2 years I might add in which under a National Government fees went up by 18 percent one year and 15 percent the other year. There was a small fracas with the police around one of those that I am still not able to fully talk about. But an important role was played by student leaders right across the country at that time.