Carter John: Education Amendment Bill (No 2) — Second Reading 
Carter John: Education Amendment Bill (No 2) — Second Reading 
[Volume:660;Page:15615] 
Hon JOHN CARTER (Minister of Civil Defence) 
 on behalf of the  
Minister of Education 
: 
 I move  
That the Education Amendment Bill (No 2) be now read a second time 
. 
Hon Member 
: Excellent. 
Hon JOHN CARTER 
: It is an excellent speech; it will just get better and better. Of course everything with the National Party gets better and better. 
The bill introduces legislation that will enable the establishment of secondary-tertiary programmes for students enrolled in school. The bill will reduce the compliance burden on what are described as limited-attendance centres by exempting them from early childhood education licensing standards. The bill will protect the sustainability of New Zealand’s export education sector by changing the refund provisions for international students enrolled in private training establishments. Amendments in the bill will improve the law affecting private schools in response to the Law Commission’s 2009 report  
Private Schools and the Law. 
 The bill will also make minor changes to school enrolment scheme priorities by offering places to out-of-zone students via a ballot process. 
Since the bill’s first reading the Education and Science Committee has recommended some amendments to strengthen the bill by clarifying some of the policy decisions. I thank members of the committee for their careful consideration of this bill. I also acknowledge the contribution of those who provided submissions. I am particularly pleased that the select committee adopted the changes proposed to the legislation affecting the New Zealand Teachers Council. I thank the committee for agreeing to consider those amendments at short notice and for their sensible and diligent attention to those serious issues. I also appreciate the committee accepting the changes proposed to teacher information matching. Currently the Education Act 1989 prevents the Ministry of Education and the Teacher Council from matching data on relieving teachers. This change will allow data matching on relieving teachers. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: It doesn’t prevent it. 
Hon JOHN CARTER 
: That may be true but this bill will now permit it. 
I will now go through the key elements of the changes to the bill recommended by the select committee. The bill has been amended to make it clear that industry training organisations cannot directly provide secondary or tertiary education but may still be involved in the arrangement of tertiary courses and work experience as part of secondary-tertiary programmes. A change has been made to refund provisions for international students to require a private training establishment to hold in trust any payments made by a foreign student enrolled in a course for under 3 months. The funds will be available for refund to the students according to the rules specified by the New Zealand Qualifications Authority. 
Five changes have been made to the legislation affecting private schools following the Law Commission’s review. The requirement for the Education Review Office to charge private schools with more than 29 foreign students for reviews has been removed from the Act. Charging the relevant private schools would be difficult to administer and would generate very little if any revenue. The legislation has been redrafted to allow the Secretary for Education to request a further Education Review Office review of private schools during extensions to provisional registration. A change has been made to include the Insolvency Act 1967 as well as the Insolvency Act 2006 when assessing a potential private school manager against the fit and proper person requirement. The bill has been amended to ensure that if the Secretary for Education finds grounds to suspend a private school’s registration the secretary must also impose conditions to allow the school the chance to lift the suspension before considering deregistration. Two other minor technical amendments have been made to this part of the bill which clarify the role of the secretary when suspending a private school’s registration. 
The bill brings creches at centres like gyms and shopping centres which look after children on a very temporary basis into line with provisions such as those that apply to Sunday schools and exempts those centres from early childhood education regulations that require education plans qualified teachers and ratio and space rules. The select committee amended the bill to allow limited-attendance centres that look after the children of employees to also be exempt from the early childhood education regulations. Those centres will continue to be subject to arrangements with the operators of the facility local government and other legislative requirements to ensure the safety and welfare of the children while recognising that parents have a responsibility to make sensible decisions with regard to minding their children. 
During the select committee process the committee was asked to consider including some further amendments regarding the New Zealand Teachers Council. The Teachers Council requested those changes in response to difficulties it was having in administering its legislation. The Teachers Council has processes in place to help teachers with competency issues to improve. However the council cannot currently show in the teacher’s registration that a teacher is going through this process. The bill has been amended to allow the Teachers Council to annotate teachers’ registrations to indicate when teachers have conditions imposed on their practising certificates due to incompetence. This will decrease the risk that schools could unknowingly employ a teacher with issues in relation to his or her competence. 
A further change will correct an anomaly in the legislation that currently prevents appropriate action being taken in certain competency or conduct issues. Cases involving possible serious misconduct by a teacher mostly result from the mandatory reports submitted by a school or a teacher but some cases result from a complaint. To ensure that children and members of the public are not put at risk it is often appropriate that a teacher be suspended until an investigation has been carried out. However the legislation currently allows for an interim suspension of a teacher only following a complaint. This amendment makes it clear that an interim suspension can also be made following a mandatory report of teacher conduct. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: Who was the silly Minister who introduced that? 
Hon JOHN CARTER 
: I am not sure but I am sure Mr Mallard had some involvement in it no doubt. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: It was me. I apologise. 
Hon JOHN CARTER 
: Well I am sure the member will take a call and make the apology himself. 
A similar issue exists regarding the actions that the Teachers Council can take if it finds a teacher to be incompetent. The Teachers Council can take action following an investigation that has been the result of a complaint about competence but not when an investigation follows a mandatory report about competence. The bill amends the Education Act 1989 to make it clear that the Teachers Council may take action following a mandatory report or a complaint about teacher competence. This provision will help to ensure that children are safe and will help to maintain and improve the quality of teachers in our schools. 
Submitters raised a further issue during the select committee consideration of these amendments. Currently the law technically requires a board of trustees to dismiss a teacher who is the subject of an interim suspension. In many cases that may be unfair for the teacher concerned. There is an intention to bring forward an amendment to the bill at the Committee of the whole House to ensure that an employer of a teacher is not forced to dismiss a teacher who has been suspended while his or her case is being investigated. Once again I thank the members of the committee for this work and I commend this bill to the House.