Hipkins ChrisHon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister of Education): Very quickly running through the extra staff in the Ministry of Education (MOE) I don't have the breakdown but I can tell him where some of the biggest areas of growth have been. School capital investment has been a big area of growth for the number of staff working at the Ministry of Education. Increasingly schools are asking the Ministry of Education to take over the management of their big capital projects. There is a lot more of that happening at the moment and that has involved employing people with those specialist skills. Unfortunately it involves a number of them and they do tend to unfortunately be quite expensive.Learning support has been a big area of growth. So these are the specialists who work with and support schools to support the children with the most complex needs. That's been one of the biggest growth areas within the ministry. Curriculum and NCEA have been an area of growth. We're going through a big NCEA change programme but also are doing more to support schools with the curriculum. So that has been an area of growth for the ministry. So those are three of the big areas of growth for the ministry but I'm sure we can provide a more detailed breakdown in due course through the select committee process.In terms of student achievement the member asked me what do I think are the things that make the biggest difference on student achievement. By far the biggest in-school contributing factor is the teacher. So in terms of bang for buck investing in teacher professional development is absolutely something that we can do that has a huge bang for buck. The programmes that we've got in place in areas like literacy and numeracy are often focused and are largely focused on teacher professional development because that is how we can shift the dial for some of those students.The other area is engagement and equity. I'd just caution the member around some of those international comparisons. Everyone looks at the headline issues—you know what's the overall trend for New Zealand? Actually the trend for a lot of our kids has been a very positive one. We started very high on those international league tables and a lot of our kids have stayed there. Our equity challenge has grown though. The tail of underachievement has grown. You know for the kids who are doing well they've continued to do well. It is the fact that our equity challenge has grown that should be the issue that we're all concerned about and where we should focus our efforts—so that engagement and equity.The member asks What's the problem with attendance?" Well the problem with attendance is kids aren't going to school regularly. Ultimately there are a range of reasons for that. The member might think that the Government is responsible for that and the Government should be raising everybody else's children. Actually parents do need to take some responsibility for getting their kids to school as well.In terms of MOE staff conduct I'm not going to comment on a broad generalisation around MOE staff conduct. If the member has a complaint about a staff member at MOE then he should bring that complaint forward and we will make sure that that gets investigated. In terms of early childhood education and the small centres around pay parity as I've already indicated the Government is aware of the feedback there and we are looking very closely at that."