Parmar ParmjeetDr PARMJEET PARMAR (National): Thank you Madam Chair. I would like to speak to my Supplementary Order Paper 102. This is to put an amendment into schedule 2. Schedule 2 in Part 1 is about ministerial appointments and this actually gives the description of what kinds of people can be appointed by the Minister as members of the Teaching Council. As we know the membership is being increased from nine to 13 and yes there will be some members who are going to be appointed by the Minister and some will be elected but this one specifically talks about ministerial appointments. It is about notification and it is also about the Gazette notice specifying the appointment process and listing the criteria of appointment that is specified in subclauses (3) and (4). But in subclause (4) when the Minister is considering someone to appoint the Minister must keep in mind that each candidate's ability to carry out the duties is there and that the person is able to represent the public interest and to have regard to the collective skills experience and knowledge making up the overall composition of the Teaching Council [and this is] including (but not limited to) the candidate's knowledge and experience in any of the following areas". It actually lists these areas: "(i) education: (ii) governance: (iii) leadership experience and skills: (iv) financial skills:"—and the fifth one in there is—"(v) understanding of the partnership principles of the Treaty of Waitangi." My amendment is to add in this subparagraph as a sixth point: "(vi) understanding of the partnership principles between the Crown and proprietors of partnership schools kura hourua." So what we have seen in this Part 1 in schedule 2 where the Minister has described the criteria of people that the Minister can appoint on the Teaching Council—it is short-sighted. This is just based on what this Government wants to but we have already announced in the National Party that we will bring partnership schools back. So it's important that any legislation that goes through the House has that vision is long-sighted and is not something that we bring back each term to change. The Minister has completely ignored the fact that partnership schools actually provide a very different kind of education model and that needs to be taken into consideration when the Minister is making appointments. So this amendment is to ensure that when appointing a member to the Teaching Council the Minister can have regard to the candidate's knowledge and experience relating to partnership schools and to how this will contribute to the collective skills experience and knowledge making up the overall composition of the council. The composition of the council is really important because this is not only about providing the experience or the background from the education sector but it's also about providing the experience from the different kinds of education models that we have in New Zealand. The partnership school model is a model that is highly regarded by people: those who have experience of sending their children to partnership school; teachers who are teaching in those partnership schools and of course those people who are running partnership schools; and people who have seen the outcomes of students who are in partnership schools—students who were not able to succeed in normal schools. So it's important that we take that into consideration and I would actually like to ask the Minister in the chair Jenny Salesa if the Minister thinks this amendment should not go ahead to give us a reason why this amendment should not be adopted and should not be made part of schedule 2. Partnership schools—yes we understand that this Government does not support that model which is giving us really good outcomes for those children who are falling through the cracks in the mainstream education system. But in the long term we definitely want to see partnership schools coming back and succeeding and providing a different education model to those students who wish to pursue that. When I'm talking about the whole governance experience I also want to talk about a submitter. This submission is from the Education Council—yes the Education Council itself. This legislation—the whole legislation—is actually to change the Education Council to Teaching Council and to change the membership and the composition of membership of the Teaching Council. So this submitter the Education Council said very clearly in their recommendations—I want to just highlight two recommendations that they made. The first one is point 8 in their submission. This is: "The Cabinet Paper on the Bill suggests it is sufficient that these skills are represented among those members appointed by the Minister."—and then it says—"The Education Council agrees there cannot be criteria imposed on elected members but we think all members of the Council should have some experience in these important skill areas especially as elected members will comprise the majority on the Council." So clearly what we have seen here is that the Education Council does not believe—[Time expired]"