Lees-Galloway Iain: Education (Freedom of Association) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Lees-Galloway Iain: Education (Freedom of Association) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:670;Page:16877] 
IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North) 
: 
 There are a number of proposed amendments to clause 4 the purpose clause. Before I address them I really must come back to some of the comments the member in the chair made. She told us when she took the opportunity to speak on the clause that for her it all hangs on the ability of students to opt out of students associations. As a former students association president I have to say again—as Chris Hipkins said—that I have some sympathy for that position. I think the situation is currently a little bit nebulous and that there is some opportunity for students associations to shirk their responsibilities. Students associations came to the select committee on the bill and said they were prepared to work on it and were prepared to look at some options. In fact really if the purpose of the bill which is stated in clause 4 is to “uphold students’ rights to freedom of association by removing any requirement for students to join students associations.” then that is all we would need to do. That is the one amendment the one change we would have to make to the principal Act to achieve the purpose in clause 4. But the fact is as we all know that is not actually the purpose of the bill. The purpose is to kill off students associations. 
How will the bill achieve that? An issue that I do not think has been addressed much—or at least the reason why there is so much concern from this side of the Chamber that has not been addressed exactly—is that students are faced with their course fees and tuition fees then further down the list there will be a student services levy and then further down the list there will be various other fees. If at the bottom of that list there is an optional fee for a students association that they have never heard of they do not know what it does they have no material to understand what it does and they do not understand the benefits of being a member of they will say they are paying so much already that they will save themselves $100 $200 or whatever it is the students association is asking for. They will opt out of it. They will say no thank you very much. They will arrive at the university and they may or may not then discover that they would have preferred to be a member of the students association. 
I can say I would have been one of those students. I was not particularly impressed when I saw the part of my invoice that stated that I was paying for a students association because I did not know what a students association was. I did not come from a family— 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: That’s because you came from King’s College. 
IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY 
: That is right; the member hit the nail on the head. That is exactly why I did not know what a students association was. I needed to learn a few things. In fact Massey University had its referendum. Ten percent of the students at Massey managed to sign a petition—the university managed to get more signatures than the ACT Party is able to get in an election—and it had a referendum. By the time the university had the referendum I had changed my view because I had had an opportunity to see what the students association did. I was particularly fond of the extremely low gym fees but I enjoyed orientation as well and I quite liked the paper. I did not often listen to the radio station but I certainly was aware of the advocacy service and I thought maybe some day I might want to use it. That was a long time before I became involved in the students association. That is exactly the response that students right across the country have. 
Going back to the purpose of the bill which states that it is to “uphold students’ rights” if it was upholding students’ rights then this would have been a change that there would have been an outpouring of emotion for. There would have been petitions and letters to parliamentarians and there would have been a huge campaign for students to have the change but there was not because people actually respect and understand what students associations do. The purpose of the bill is to pander to a very very narrow small section of the student population at the expense of the bulk of the students associations. It is something for the few at the expense of the many—the vast majority of students on campus. That is the actual purpose of the bill. Students associations do a lot of good for their students but the member in the chair seems to want to overlook that completely. 
We have a number of amendments to clause 4.