8. Question No. 8—EducationDr SHANE RETI (National—Whangarei) to the Minister of EducationQuestion No. 8—Education8. Dr SHANE RETI (National—Whangarei) to the Minister of Education: Does he stand by all his statements and actions around the Reform of Vocational Education?Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister of Education): Yes.Dr Shane Reti: When he said on TV ONE news last night that industry training organisation (ITO) concerns were scaremongering" and "making it up" were similar concerns in the New Zealand Herald also scaremongering and making it up in the 7 March editorial titled "Hipkins needs to rethink his tertiary shake-up"?Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: The comments that I was referring to among many were things such as that the Government was proposing to take training out of the hands of industry abolish ITOs rationalise the polytechs into one mega institute and give that institute the power over all industry training take industry training away from industry itself and give it to a centralised Government appointed body with no relationship with industry. All of those statements are simply wrong. They are wrong in fact they are not in the proposals and they do not reflect what is in the proposals.Dr Shane Reti: How will there be more tradespeople in apprenticeships under these reforms when electricians employing seven apprentices in Wānaka four apprentices in Nelson six apprentices in Invercargill and 200 apprentices in Dunedin all say they are unlikely to take on apprentices under these reforms?Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: Well one of the challenges of course is that we have had a significant drop in the number of people engaged in industry training—40000 fewer people in industry training during the term of the last National Government. One of the concerns of course that we've got is that currently only around 15 percent of employers are actually engaged in industry training and there is a very weak link if any link between some of the training that's delivered off the job through the polytech sector and the skills that employers are requiring on the job. These are all well-known problems that have been decades in the making that have never properly been addressed and that industry training organisations have been arguing for quite some time need to be addressed. This Government is addressing them.Hon Tracey Martin: Can he confirm that the Reform of Vocational Education is still a discussion document hence why people are discussing it and that he has also been having intense conversations with ITOs with business to make sure that when we do make final decisions they are going to be the right ones?Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: Yes I can confirm that they are currently proposals although I can't confirm that consultation is happening with every ITO because one of the ITOs that's most loud in its criticism of the short consultation period is refusing to engage in the consultation at all.Dr Shane Reti: How will there be more tradespeople in apprenticeships under these reforms when an industry employer writes "If the Government pushes through with this change I will seriously assess whether I continue training electrical apprentices. In all likelihood I will probably hire labourers which is a bad outcome for all of us."?Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: I understand that employer's concern because the information they've been given about what the proposals are is factually incorrect.Dr Shane Reti: What is required for the Minister to delay the 1 January transfer of industry training to polytechnics given written questions confirm industry is currently training 46000 apprentices and polytechnics are training only 1265?Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: I'd encourage the member to have a thorough read of the consultation document so he understands what the proposals actually are. We're proposing to give industry and employers more say over the skills that are provided through off-the-job training and on-the-job training which is something that the industry training sector have been arguing for for quite some time. What we're also proposing to do is effectively create a one-stop shop for employers around their training needs so they don't have to deal with multiple different ITOs and multiple different training providers. They can actually get a much more seamless training system in place something that employers have been asking for for quite some. The fact that they haven't had it is probably one of the reasons why only 15 percent of them are currently engaged in any form of formalised industry training."