Moroney Sue: Education (Polytechnics) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Moroney Sue: Education (Polytechnics) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
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SUE MORONEY (Labour) 
: 
 I will make a contribution on Part 2 of the Education (Polytechnics) Amendment Bill. Of course Labour also opposes it because it brings transitional matters to bear on the newly constituted councils. In particular it brings in the concept of “reconstitution day” for polytechnic councils. Yet we still have not heard one single reason why there is a need for reconstitution of these polytechnic councils. 
But we know that as a result of Part 2 of this bill there is a narrow window of opportunity for the current councils to have at least some say over what the constitution of those polytechnic councils will look like going forward. They have a small window of opportunity between 1 March 2010 and 1 May 2010 to say the types of people who will be filling the four positions that this Government is allowing councils to have some say over. Of course of the eight positions in total the Minister will have complete say over the appointment of four of them—that is half of the council will be under the direct control of the Minister. Current councils will have that small window of opportunity next year to determine that they think it is important that student representatives be on their committees. They have an opportunity to say so but it is only a small window of opportunity. 
That means that come reconstitution day we could find that we have some very differently constituted polytechnic councils right throughout the country. Although all of us on this side of the Chamber embrace diversity we also think it is important to have some consistency within the sector. But this Government on reconstitution day will bring about absolutely no consistency in the membership of those councils up and down the country. Sadly we have seen that the Government has voted against the Maori Party amendment to Part 1 so no doubt we will see some polytechnic councils with no representation of Maori. On reconstitution day then it will be very interesting to see exactly which councils have gone for what type of representation. 
This bill is so badly written and has been so badly debated that I am almost ashamed to say I am a member of the Education and Science Committee which deliberated on it and made it worse. The only thing that makes me very proud is that the Labour members on the select committee produced a very good minority report because we did not agree with the majority view of the select committee which brought the bill back from the committee in a worse state than it had arrived in. We face the situation where if those councils do not or cannot decide themselves by 1 May next year then the Minister will appoint every single position—all eight—to the polytechnic council in a particular region. The Minister will appoint them should a council not be able to agree in that narrow window of opportunity who its community representatives should be. 
It is also entirely possible under this bill that a polytechnic could end up with no one from its actual community on the council because nowhere in this bill is there a requirement at all for anyone from the geographical area in which that polytechnic council resides to be appointed or elected to any of those eight positions. We could find that situation on reconstitution day. 
Furthermore on reconstitution day we could find polytechnic councils where there are no women where there is no gender representation or where there is no ethnic representation. It became very apparent during the select committee process as the submitters came in to see us that far and away the way in which most polytechnic councils get women on to their councils is primarily through staff representation and—we can guess this one—also through student representation. Now that those positions have been removed from being dedicated positions around the council table if this bill goes through in its entirety I think that on reconstitution day 1 May we will see fewer women on polytechnic sector councils. I think that that is a great shame. 
My colleague Steve Chadwick speaking before talked about the importance of training early childhood educators for example in polytechnics and I say that we certainly need that voice.