Hipkins ChrisEDUCATION AMENDMENT BILLThird ReadingHon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister of Education): I move That the Education Amendment Bill be now read a third time.This is a watershed moment for New Zealand's quality public education system. It is a moment in which we put education over ideology and we reject the notions of privatisation and deregulation instead returning our focus to a quality public education system for all New Zealanders. This bill is a major first step in fulfilling the Government's promises for education. It delivers on the commitments made by the Labour Party the New Zealand First Party and the Green Party through successive elections to put the focus back on quality public education that works for all New Zealanders. We have a collective vision as a Government for a quality education system for actually measuring a student's progress across the whole of the New Zealand Curriculum for restoring student and staff voice and representation in the education system and for a schooling system that supports all of the children in it.This bill delivers on these commitments. It strengthens the quality of school education by removing national standards which did not work and which prevented teachers from doing the job of teaching young New Zealanders. It removes the charter school model from New Zealand law and brings an end to the privatisation and deregulation of our public school system. It improves the governance of our tertiary education institutions by restoring places for elected staff and students on their councils. It supports the introduction of fees-free tertiary education by making it an offence to make a false representation about an application for free tertiary education and it improves the new strategic planning and reporting framework for State and State-integrated schools and I will speak to each of those provisions now.We are removing national standards. They were neither national nor were they standard. They led to an enormous increase in workload and compliance costs for schools and they did not lead to an improvement in student outcomes. They were passed by the incoming National Government at the end of 2008 under urgency. They didn't send them to a select committee which is ironic because they're now accusing us of being undemocratic in their removal. This bill went all the way through the democratic process including a full select committee hearing at which every New Zealander could have their say on it unlike the introduction of them which was passed in a matter of hours under urgency by the incoming National Government. National standards were a woeful failure and will for ever be a blight on the track record of the previous National Government because they showed that they were putting ideology over education—the obsession with measurement and accountability over what is in the best interests of New Zealand children. While national standards were introduced and implemented the performance of New Zealand children went backwards. They did not improve the ability of New Zealand kids to read write and do maths. In fact during the time national standards were in place that got worse. So we want to see the focus go back on teaching and learning because that is the thing that is going to improve the lot of young New Zealanders. This bill removes charter schools from New Zealand law. We are committed to having a quality public education system. When it comes to disadvantaged young New Zealanders we do not believe they should have to be driven out of the public education system to get the education they deserve and that is what the members opposite continue to argue for. They continue to talk about Māori and Pasifika educational achievement as if the answer to that is to take a handful of them out of the public education system and put them in a deregulated education system where the safeguards are not in place to protect them. We don't agree with that approach. We think the answer to Māori and Pasifika educational achievement in New Zealand is to make sure every public school in the country is delivering them the education that they deserve and that is what this Government is going to deliver. To give two examples of the failures of the charter school system: first we had a charter school fail within the first year of operation and the money still has not come back—and probably never will come back—into the public education system. Millions of dollars were flushed down the drain by the members opposite in the name of their ideology of charter schools. The second example happened under this Government where we had to step in to stop a charter school closing in the middle of the school year and putting kids out on the street because they had a lease that expired in the middle of the school year and they couldn't renew it. That's the kind of dodgy slap-up model of education that was being promoted by members on the other side. We don't believe in that. We believe that we should have a quality robust education system that delivers all young New Zealanders the quality of education they should have that has qualified registered teachers who actually know what they're doing delivering education to young New Zealanders—they should be teaching to the New Zealand Curriculum—and that should have education first and foremost as its priority. The privatised deregulated model of charter schooling did not guarantee those things. Now as for the claims by the members opposite that those existing partnership schools as they call them which everyone knows to be charter schools—to claim that they are being closed is wrong because actually we recognise that while the model was flawed there were some people within it who had absolutely the right intentions. So we will work with them and we have been working with them to transition them into the public education system so that they can continue to do what they are passionate about which is educating young New Zealanders. It is absolutely wrong for the members opposite to continue to mislead and claim that those schools are being closed when they know they are not. But what's more it is also wrong for them to trash the reputation of the schools that are transitioning into the public education system before they've had the chance to do that. By saying that those schools will no longer be able to do and no longer be able to deliver equality of education to the kids in their schools they are trashing the reputation of those schools and they are not putting the best interests of the kids who are attending those schools at the forefront of their consideration. That's not just me that's saying that; that's the operators of those schools who are saying that who have been outraged at the way their kids have been politicised by the members opposite because they are not operating in the best interests of those kids and that is what this Government is committed to doing.With regard to the governance changes for tertiary institutions they should never have been removed. The National Government said that it would be better—we would get better governance of our polytechs for example if staff and students weren't on their councils. Well how's that worked out? How's that actually worked out? We've got a polytech system that is in the worst state that it has ever been. The Government has had to remove several of those councils because of chronic governance failures. Millions and millions of dollars in taxpayer funding is having to go into bailing out those institutions because they have been failing and that all happened under National's watch. When they were claiming they were going to improve the governance of those institutions they failed spectacularly. Staff and students bring a legitimate perspective to the governance of those institutions. It's one that never should have been taken away and we are putting it back and we are making it right.The final changes that I want to talk about are the changes to the strategic planning and reporting requirements that were introduced under the previous Government. We believe in those changes—or at least most of us do believe in those changes—but we think that they were being rushed. We need to take our time and we need to get them right and that is what the provisions in this bill allow for. They change the time frames and they ensure that we will get that right so that schools have the ability to plan for the future and that the interests of their kids are being put first in that process.This bill fulfils commitments that all three of the parties in Government made during the election campaign and committed to when we became the Government. We have worked hand in hand to deliver these changes for New Zealand because we know that they are going to be in the best interests of our education system. I want to particularly acknowledge the members of the Education and Workforce Committee—the Labour New Zealand First and Green members in particular—who worked as a cohesive stable solid team to deliver these changes which are going to be in the best interests of all New Zealanders.