Katene Rahui: Education Amendment Bill (No 2) — Second Reading 
Katene Rahui: Education Amendment Bill (No 2) — Second Reading 
[Volume:660;Page:15625] 
RAHUI KATENE (Maori Party—Te Tai Tonga) 
: 
 I am pleased to stand and speak on the Education Amendment Bill (No 2) today. A very interesting assessment of the current state of our education system was made in the Post Primary Teachers Association (PPTA) submission to the Education and Science Committee on the bill. A comment was made by the former Deputy Minister of Education from Ontario Professor Ben Levin that when we look at New Zealand education policy we see “lots of good projects but no strategy.” They are words that could very well have summed up this bill. 
It is a pretty good idea to refund course fees for international students who leave their courses before they are completed but what about the bigger strategic direction in respect of international education or student fees? Another great idea is to stipulate specific requirements that would enable managers of private schools to be assessed as “fit and proper” for the responsibilities of managing a school. But again I ask what strategy is emerging from private schooling. 
In Budget 2009 an extra $10 million was announced to supposedly make private schools more affordable with $2.6 million going into Aspire Scholarships to provide assistance for students from low-income families to attend private schools. But how do we know whether that funding has made a difference? Was it just a nice gift to independent schools? How many Maori families have benefited from that gift? How effective has it been in overcoming the long tail of underachievement and system failure which is consistently reported in the education sector? 
There is also the issue of the removal of early childhood education regulatory requirements for limited-attendance centres. These centres are set up to provide short-term care in places like gyms or shopping malls. Again it seems a good idea that there should be a different set of standards in place for such short-term centres. The last thing we want to do is make the compliance costs so burdensome that parents are stung by over-the-top fees for what is essentially an hour or two of supervision. 
Some parents have it so easy. I remember when I had to go shopping with my five children. We did not have childcare centres there then. I had to take my five children with me and they screamed around the supermarket and the mall. But now we have shopping malls with childcare centres and that is a fantastic idea. But we should not make it too burdensome for parents to be able to leave their children there. We are not expecting such centres to provide comprehensive and developmentally appropriate learning opportunities. But on the other hand we do not expect those centres to compromise the health and safety of our precious children. So we take on board the concerns of Te Tari Puna Ora o Aotearoa the New Zealand Childcare Association that safety and well-being must not be compromised for short-term gain. 
Finally we come to the project proposed to open up secondary-tertiary programmes. We were interested to see that this project received support from as wide as the Human Rights Commission and the PPTA. The commission said that the experience of the Manukau Institute of Technology in seeking the opportunity to enable a tertiary high school to operate there should be supported in other centres. The PPTA did suggest however that the legislation would do well to learn from the successful models of secondary-tertiary partnerships which have been trialled and positively evaluated to support students into work or further training. It talked about the fact that in most areas industry training organisations polytechnics and some private providers have successfully built partnerships that enable students to pursue alternative pathways towards work and further education while still at secondary school. 
The Maori Party is willing to support this bill to enable opportunities to enhance education that will result in positive outcomes. But we do return to the question of the proper strategy to really make the difference. In essence the ideas in this legislation are just tinkering around the edges leaving the enormity of the problems confronting the education sector untouched. This bill will not make the difference that is desperately needed. Although that does not mean we should vote this bill down it does mean we will continue to be vigilant in asking the Minister of Education about what she is doing in respect of general schooling and making the gains that we expect to see for Maori children. 
The Hon Dr Pita Sharples is working in the area of kaupapa Maori education. He has announced a national review of Maori language education and is helping to keep a focus on quality and excellence in kaupapa Maori schooling. But the reality is that less than 5 percent of our kids are in kura kaupapa education leaving the great bulk of Maori children in the general system in the mainstream. The 2005 annual report on Maori education showed that Maori students in year 11 who attended schools where teaching was in te reo for between 51 and 100 percent of the time had a higher rate of attaining National Certificate of Educational Achievement qualifications than Maori attending other schools. We have known that fact for 5 years yet it still seems we are doing very little other than Te Kotahitanga to make the difference we need for Maori children to succeed in general schooling. 
I have outlined the strategic questions that we expected this bill to cover. But they are not covered. I guess we have to admit that the bill was never set up to answer those questions but it does not mean to say that the bigger questions should not be asked.