Martin Tracey: Education (Charter Schools Curriculum) Amendment Bill — First ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeMartin Tracey: Education (Charter Schools Curriculum) Amendment Bill — First Reading[Sitting date: 14 October 2015. Volume:709;Page:7228. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]TRACEY MARTIN (NZ First): I almost feel sorry for charter schools actually. After the contribution from that side of the House I almost feel sorry for them. First of all Mr Williamson just stood up and made it very clear that he knows so little about education that he thought that a decile 10 school was the lowest-decile school. How sad sad sad. He also just stood up and suggested that every child in a charter school is a low-achieving child who is going to fail in a State school. That does a disservice—a disservice—to the children in let us say the Whangarei kura. The Whangarei kura actually came out of the trust to do with the Māori Battalion with the Māori Battalion special character provision.David Seymour: How come this member can just make things up?TRACEY MARTIN: So what it shows—Mr Seymour stood up and gave the greatest show of ignorance which is how we ended up with charter schools in the first place. It was because Mr Seymour was so ignorant of these curriculum documents was so ignorant about what was actually happening and the changes going on in the New Zealand education system that he brought charter schools as his blackmail piece to the Government. That was the cost of the ACT Party’s vote.These are the curriculum documents for New Zealand that I have here. These are the curriculum documents. They are world recognised—world recognised. Here is the bit that charter schools have to follow. If ever we needed to know why we needed to have these curriculum documents in this piece of legislation—I am referring to Whangaruru charter school and the non-existent Ngāti Wai curriculum they were supposed to be delivering. The Ngāti Wai curriculum that Natasha Sadler was supposed to be writing—when the school opened the writing of it had not been finished. Children were out getting sea eggs—kina—and so on and so forth. Delivering them to elders was somehow part of the Ngāti Wai curriculum. But we could not measure it. We could not give them a qualification in it but apparently Mr Seymour argues for that sort of leeway for charter schools. He does and this Government does those children a disservice.At the same time those members suggest that a school such as Vanguard Military School which they laud saying it has a 100 percent pass rate certainly uses pieces of the New Zealand Curriculum for example maths and English—because it has to because the Government has set those subjects at an 85 percent pass rate exactly the same as it is for State schools. It is exactly the same at State schools. Vanguard pupils pick up a science: biology. When I visited Vanguard the principal there—actually I am not even sure he is a principal; he is not a trained teacher. The gentleman in charge of the Vanguard charter school said to me: “Well we only offer that science because actually our kids can’t really reach for the other stuff.” How aspirational is that—how aspirational is that?This is also the school that has a 100 percent National Certificate of Educational Achievement level 2 pass rate and has as one of its other subjects—not in this State curriculum—defence force studies. I cannot for the life of me find anywhere in any country an outline of what defence force studies are. That subject goes along with physical education. So what we have got at Vanguard because it does not follow the New Zealand Curriculum documents in any way shape or form is maths we have got English we have got biology we have got physical education and we have got defence force studies. That is it. That is what you are offered when you go to Vanguard.Mr Williamson stands and says “No child is forced into it. No child is forced into it.” but the continued suggestion to parents is that actually they are going to get this amazing standard of education. It is not happening. It is not happening in those schools. Charter schools actually have the same academic outcomes as the majority of current New Zealand schools.David Seymour: Not true.TRACEY MARTIN: I just want to make this clear—and Mr Seymour would not know because Mr Seymour does not bother to actually go and visit New Zealand State schools. He does not bother to go and see innovation in New Zealand State schools. He is fixated on privatising and breaking down the New Zealand education system but he has no desire to go and actually have a look at a real State school doing its job.I want to make this very clear: New Zealand First will support this bill not because we believe charter schools should be here—this bill needs to go through for the 6 years of the contracts that are currently in place so that we can save those children from what happened at Whangaruru. But believe you me when New Zealand First gets into a place of influence those contracts will not be renewed.