English Bill: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
English Bill: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
[Volume:619;Page:14882] 
4.  
Hon BILL ENGLISH (National—Clutha-Southland) 
 to the  
Associate Minister of Education (Tertiary Education) 
: When will he begin investigations at Tairawhiti Polytechnic the Manukau Institute of Technology the Eastern Institute of Technology and other big recipients of community education funding in order to ensure that enrolments resulted in student engagement and learning as he indicated he would yesterday? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY (Associate Minister of Education (Tertiary Education)) 
: 
 The Tertiary Education Commission has already been investigating all community education funding recipients where concerns have been raised in relation to enrolments and learner engagement. In addition in June the commission decided to undertake a further review of community education focusing on selected polytechnics including the ones the member mentioned. Joanna Beresford of Martin Jenkins and Associates has been commissioned to undertake the review and the commission has written to all tertiary education institutions explaining the scope and the timing of the review. The outcome of this work will be used to assess the community education component and the profiles that the institutions submit to the commission. The review will also clarify best practice for setting priorities in this area and will highlight issues for further development in the management of community education. 
Hon Bill English 
: Will the Minister apply the same rules to those other polytechnics that he has said he will apply to Christchurch Polytechnic—namely that if they cannot show that the thousands of students they enrolled did at least some of the course he will require them to refund the money the taxpayer paid for those courses? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: As the member knows the Tertiary Education Commission has set powers under the Act. At the present time it is exercising those by talking with institutions about whether enrolments are valid and whether learner engagement has taken place. I have been on record as saying that in my view where people have misused or inappropriately used the Government funding that money should be paid back. 
Dr Ashraf Choudhary 
: What action has the Minister taken to tighten the tertiary funding rules? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: When I became the Minister responsible for the tertiary education area tuition subsidies had just been uncapped by the previous Government. It has become increasingly apparent that the funding rules I inherited were not adequate. As a result over the past 4 years I have regulated tuition fees imposed a moratorium and then a cap on private providers put restrictions on the inclusion of rewards and equipment such as computers as a part of courses put a restriction on overseas travel capped aviation limited the maximum annual enrolment growth rate to 15 percent and capped community education. It does take quite a long time to clean up National Government messes. 
Hon Bill English 
: If the Minister has taken all those measures then why has there been an $800 million increase in equivalent full-time student funding and why has by far the majority of that gone on community funding and foundation-level courses that have been described by his own officials as “EFTS harvesting for financial gain”—and is that not an $800 million mess? 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY 
: I think the reason that numbers have grown so rapidly in the 5.1 area is that people have seen the Government closing doors one by one around funding. The institutions know they are being profiled this year and they know that once those profiles are in place a funding agreement will be signed which will limit what they can do. That is why I regret that some of the institutions appear to have taken that last gasp of opportunity to use National’s funding model.