Seymour DavidDAVID SEYMOUR (Leader—ACT): I rise on behalf of the ACT Party in opposition to this bill. I think what we have just seen from Jenny Salesa is what happens when a thoughtful generally respected diligent member stands up and gives a speech that she does not truly believe in that the people in her electorate and community do not truly believe in about a subject about which she knows almost nothing. She complains that partnership schools kura hourua are taking money—well yes they are taking money because they are educating students. Was the member seriously arguing that the students at partnership schools kura hourua are not deserving of education funding? Of course money is going to them because the students attending the schools are entitled to that money. She says that the model has failed overseas—well she obviously has not read Stanford University's Center for Research on Education Outcomes—CREDO—research in the United States. She obviously has not read C. D. Howe Institute's research of charter schools in Alberta. She obviously knows nothing about the free school movement in Sweden or the success that they have had for students in that country. She talked about Whangaruru—she said that the schools are unaccountable in the same breath that she talked about the school that did fail and that we closed because it failed. She talked about the curriculum. Well the fact of the matter is that partnership schools kura hourua are required to teach a curriculum that maps to the principles of the New Zealand curriculum or its Māori equivalent. She talked about transparency. How many other schools are required to issue four quarterly reports including reports that have their performance data for national standards and NCEA results? There is no other type of school that has to report that data on a quarterly basis or that can be closed for failing to meet its targets on that data. That was an embarrassment of a speech. The member knows nothing about the topic and I doubt she really believes it. She said that the schools are not subject to the Official Information Act (OIA)—many organisations supply services to the Government but are not subject to the OIA. With all of the disclosure to the Ministry of Education that I just mentioned—here is news for the member: the Ministry of Education is subject to the OIA therefore there is more OIA-able data about partnership schools kura hourua than for any other type. Then she complained that they make profit. Well she is factually incorrect because almost all of the current partnership schools are not-for-profit trusts. However let us just say they are all making a profit. Well I hate to tell the member but there is profit throughout the education system. The people who build the classrooms the people who make the computers and the people who sell the stationery are all making profit. If the member wants to banish profit from the education system there would not be very much of it left. But that is sadly what happens when a member who is otherwise thoughtful and intelligent gets up to take a call for someone else when she does not believe in what she is saying. It is also an embarrassing day for the Labour Party. The Labour Party—which introduced Tomorrow's Schools under the great David Lange and effectively made every school a charter school by the standards of the day—is now reduced to such weak argument based on factual inaccuracies. But let us talk a little bit about partnership schools because New Zealand's State school system actually works very well for the average student. The problem is it leaves far too many disengaged and not achieving their potential. That is the reality. This is especially worrying because in the 21st century we see globalisation we see automation and we see low-skilled jobs disappearing. It will be the century of knowledge and skills. For the Labour Party and the teachers' unions the solution will always be to throw more money at the problem and hope for the best but we know that that just has not worked. Labour has spent billions in its time in office and barely dented the problem. International comparisons show—and might have predicted this—that beyond a certain amount of expenditure per child more money simply does not make a difference. The Opposition's approach to education is best summed up as Every single local State school should be the very best school for your child."—every single local State school must be the very best school for your child. We did hear a little bit about that in Jenny Salesa's speech. But the question is obvious: kids are a pretty diverse bunch so how can one type of school cater for the needs of every student? Or do the schools just default to helping the average student so to speak asking the rest to conform or become frustrated disengaged and slip through the cracks which sadly is the reality for too many children today. As William Butler Yeats once said: "Education is not the filling of a pail but the lighting of a fire." That means an approach that works for one student may not work for another. Some students thrive in a structured traditional environment such as the Vanguard Military School; others prefer more freedom such as the Rise UP Trust school in South Auckland. Some love open-plan bustle while others need quiet learning spaces. Some are engaged by the arts and others by hands-on engineering. It is a delusion to believe that every school across the country can address the full spectrum of needs and potential held by Kiwi students. The reality is that specialisation and choice are vital if we want an education system with something to offer every child. The State should fund a range of schools. It should let kids and parents choose what lights their particular fire not just what school is closest to them. We should be celebrating diversity not just one size fits all. Partnership schools—also known as charter schools as the member incorrectly referenced them throughout her speech—now have close to 1000 students. That is families of 1000 students have made the choice to attend these schools whether they be Steiner whether they be Māori-medium whether they have a military ethos. While all of these schools have open enrolment policies there are trends in the types of students they attract. Mostly they are students who have been disproportionately underserved or let down by the State school system. I am aware of a significant number of partnership school students who were not attending any school at all before they enrolled at their current partnership school. We talk about the Whangaruru one—I know of one student at Whangaruru who was 14 years old and had not been registered by the New Zealand education system at all at that stage. They did not exist in the education system's records.Tracey Martin: Terrible Government. What have they done for the truancy service then? That is shocking.DAVID SEYMOUR: Well Tracey Martin the student would have started education at the time that the New Zealand First Party and Labour were in power and I do not understand why they did not make sure that that student was registered but that is by the by. Unfortunately Chris Hipkins' member's bill would seek to close down all partnership schools casting these students back to the system that let them down or worse out of the school system entirely which was the reality for many of them before that. The sad thing is that most Labour MPs—and there are some notable exceptions and I commend them—have never visited a partnership school. They are not even interested in seeing the life-changing work happening at these schools and facing up to the students and parents who choose to attend them but they would like to close the school. They will try to belittle the choice. Maybe they should take a leaf out of US President Barack Obama's policy. He calls charter schools incubators of innovation and holds an annual charter school week under his presidency. But apart from anything else we can argue about the ideology and the data all of which comes out in favour of partnership schools. But here is the real question and the question that Jenny Salesa and other members opposite might like to ask themselves: why is it that parents in my community are choosing partnership schools kura hourua? Why is it that community groups in my electorate are applying in large numbers to establish partnership schools kura hourua? Maybe the choices that these people are making are actually telling you something about their preference. The successes that come out with these students are many. Two years ago a partnership school student told me: "I never knew I was smart until I came here." Opposition members should just think about that for a moment. It is all very well to talk about the ideology but let us just think about that for a moment: a student who would have gone through her life thinking that she was not smart when presented with a new option realised that she was very very smart. The fact of the matter is that had she not been given that opportunity she would never have made that realisation. Are members opposite really in favour of removing options that allow students to discover their success? It is replicated right across the partnership school system. Te Kura Hourua o Whangarei Terenga Parāoa last year achieved pass rates of 84 percent in NCEA level 1 and 100 percent in level 2. Vanguard Military School achieved 93 percent for level 1 and 100 percent for level 2. It is early days at this point. These results will be continuously monitored. The schools will be held to account by the Crown; they will be closed if they do not succeed. That is the reason that I focus on the principle of choice and the reality of results. It is because the vocal opponents of this policy will do anything to avoid engaging in ideas and facts on this issue as we saw from Jenny Salesa just this evening. They will put forward spurious accusations and outright falsehoods as I rebutted earlier in this speech. But I would just ask one very simple question for people listening at home: are the opponents of partnership schools really so worried that eight very small schools are not going to succeed and will close and fail and their students will go back to the State system? Is that their concern? Or are they—and their union supporters—terrified that partnership schools are going to be an enormous success growing in popularity and revolutionising the old order and the way we do things in New Zealand education?"