Coddington Deborah: Public Finance (State Sector Management) Bill — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Coddington Deborah: Public Finance (State Sector Management) Bill — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee 
[Sitting date: 14 December 2004. Volume:622;Page:17858. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
DEBORAH CODDINGTON (ACT) 
: 
 We are debating Part 1 of this huge bill and I want to deal with clause 6 “Interpretation” which deals with the definitions of Crown entity and Crown entity group and the meaning that is given to a Crown entity. The Government argues that the amendments on Supplementary Order Paper 315 in the name of the Hon Dr Michael Cullen exclude tertiary institutions and universities from that. In fact all that it has done is to exclude them from some of the requirements to provide information. But the Government is not preserving the status quo. In fact it is being very tricky with regard to its definition of the status quo. The Minister may say that he is preserving the status quo because in practice the State Services Commission may offer policy advice on higher learning issues to tertiary institutions—the commission may offer that advice.Yes that is the status quo but the commission does not have a statutory legislative requirement to do that. In fact if we are to legislate for the commission to be brought into doing that why do we have the Tertiary Education Commission and the Ministry of Education? Are those not the proper agencies for the Government to seek policy advice from? Why trick around with the definition of the status quo? The Minister knows that in reality that is what he is doing. He looks bewildered but he knows exactly what I am talking about. He has seen the same correspondence that I refer to. He knows that the status quo in practice is not the same as it is in statutory terms. 
The other day I ran into the Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey Palmer in the Koru lounge. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: Name-dropper! 
DEBORAH CODDINGTON 
: I had never met Sir Geoffrey Palmer before so yes I am name-dropping. He is one of Labour’s people. It was on the same day that the  
New Zealand Herald 
 had published an editorial that decried the undermining of academic freedom by this bill. I showed Sir Geoffrey Palmer the editorial and he was astounded by it. He said that he had understood that when the amendments to the Education Act were passed he had safeguarded the universities from that very issue. He was appalled that the party he had led—his own people—now that it was in Government would do that to the universities when he had tried not to do that. 
There are polytechs that have behaved appallingly when it comes to public money and they should be brought under control. Nobody is arguing against that. Christchurch Polytechnic is a case in point. However this Government is using one institution—and there are more but I am naming one—as a Trojan Horse to rope all tertiary education institutions into the same corral and exert control over them. The universities have presented numerous submissions to the Government on this issue. In fact they were assured in the words of the former State Services Commissioner Michael Wintringham that the universities had been brought into this legislation “more in the nature of a cock-up and not a conspiracy.” They were assured by Mr Wintringham that tertiary education institutions would be excluded from that provision but all that the Government has done as a sop to the Vice-Chancellors Committee is to bring in a Supplementary Order Paper that excludes them from the reporting requirements set out in clauses 174 to 176. 
That is not enough. The Minister needs to take a call to explain why this Government wants to include universities and public tertiary institutions under the definition of Crown entities. I refer to clause 48(1); the Minister has seen it. The universities are clearly listed in it.