Parata HekiaHon HEKIA PARATA (Minister of Education): If I could just go back to a couple of points raised by both Ms Martin and Ms Delahunty in respect of in the first instance seclusion. The first is that the bill provides for guidelines to be established already so I do not think that an extra provision of that nature is necessary. Training is already in place. Workshops on managing challenging behaviour are available to schools and it seems to me that schools should be in the position of saying This is something that we really do need to get to grips with because we have these challenges." and the ministry will respond. Where there are behaviour management plans the ministry can provide specialist advice—and will do so—to those particular schools.In terms of the distinction between time out and seclusion I agree with the members that it is really important. It does depend on body language as well as verbal communication and also the context that has been established for kids. To say that a teacher cannot make a kid go into time out—whereas the seclusion that we are getting rid of was involuntary—there are already guidelines on how to use time out and what alternatives there are to seclusion. Those were circulated to all schools last year when this issue became pressing. So guidelines general training and specific interventions are available.On the matter of the appointment of a trustee—and thank you; I agree that there are times when that might be necessary—again I want to put this in the overall context of what the bill is seeking to do and that is to provide a continuum of interventions. Right now the threshold to intervene when a school is clearly in trouble is so high that the intervention is actually either a statutory manager taking over one some or almost all functions or putting in a commissioner and removing the board altogether. So the bill sets out a continuum that begins at a much lower level that says: "Look we think there's a problem here. Can we come and work with you towards the appointment of a new trustee on to the board?"The idea that that trustee might also be appointed as chair is still a much lower-level intervention than a commissioner. If a Minister were to make that appointment it would be circumstance-specific because that might be what is deemed to be required but moreover that chair would have only one vote whereas a commissioner obviously becomes the board. So it is in the context of greater flexibility of interventions it is in the context of what is fit for the circumstance of that school and it is in the context of not going to some of the more stringent options to help a school recover.Coming to questions that have been asked most recently by Mr Hipkins—although there was also a reference by I think Ms Martin—a reduction in numbers would occur only where there were four or more schools that were combining and there was no suggestion that that should be particular positions on the board and all of it would be after community consultation. The point of governance of course is to be effective not simply to have as wide a representation—well sorry we do want to have wide representation but it also has to be manageable.In terms of a question asked by Mr Hipkins there would be only two categories of reasons for combining boards: (1) where there were performance issues or (2) where it was requested. And certainly it does admit the possibility that over time communities of learning might say: "Actually instead of having 10 boards we'd like to have one with more effective representation—one with good community participation." But it certainly does not prescribe that that should happen and every question before a board must be decided by majority—which is what you were concerned about Ms Martin.I think I have covered all the questions that have been asked and if I have not I would be grateful to have them repeated to me. Thank you."