Delahunty Catherine: General DebateText is subject to correctionDelahunty Catherine: General Debate[Sitting date: 04 December 2013. Volume:695;Page:15243. Text is subject to correction.]CATHERINE DELAHUNTY (Green): It is a pleasure to follow the Shakespearean tones of the National MP Chris Auchinvole. He painted a very evocative picture of a post-apocalyptic world where the West Coast is closed. However the boom and bust cycles that are attached to the industry that he was describing—the mining industry—is one of the reasons for those apocalyptic moments in the history of areas like the West Coast andWaihī.However I am not going to talk about that; I am going to talk about the education system which has been the theme this afternoon and whether it is working. Even before the Programme for International Student Assessment survey one might worry when you get people who are aspiring to be leaders of political parties in Parliament who are not sure whether man landed on the moon or are not sure whetherchemtrails are real or not. It does make us wonder whether the education system is not working or whether those are just the ramblings of an individual who has lost touch with reality for some other reasons. However it is very important—Hon Dr Jonathan Coleman: So do you thinkchemtrails are real?CATHERINE DELAHUNTY: The Green position onchemtrails is that many people have too much time on their hands for conspiracy theories.Hon Dr Jonathan Coleman: No do you believe in them or not?CATHERINE DELAHUNTY: I absolutely do not believe inchemtrails.In the urgent debate that we just held on education however the Minister of Education told the Opposition that we should stop being binary and we should have a constructive educational conversation. Then she yelled at the Opposition to grow up. Unfortunately for the Minister this is a failed educational method for inspiring dialogue let alone change. Just agreeing with the Minister is not dialogue. Being yelled at does not work.I do agree with the Minister that we need to strengthen the teaching profession and we need to support all children in Aotearoa to get the best but what the Programme for International Student Assessment survey tells us is that the bad educational policies of the last 5 years in particular have entrenched disadvantage. We need to really look at that survey but it is not the be-all and end-all. What it is telling us this time in the chapter on economic disadvantage and educational equity issues is that our country is decreasing when everyone else is increasing. Our country is failing when everyone else is succeeding.It is no good to just keep trotting out these programmes for success without looking at the context that we are operating in. The education system does not exist in a vacuum. It is very much part of the economic situation of our country which right now is bedevilled with a number of Government policies that are not working. Education is just one of them. There is also the asset sales debacle and I would urge everybody out there to vote to make sure that the Government gets the message about that very very clearly—that we do not want to sell our assets. Also there is the debacle over Skycity youth rates the gutting of the Resource Management Act and even one of the most mean-spirited things which is the cup of tea. No one is allowed a cup of tea at work. They do not have the right to a break. That one to me is one of the most mean-spirited pathetic and ghastly things that you would possibly imagine you could say to people in the workplace who do not have a lot of power. After spending the night with the cleaners in this very very hot building boy did we want a cup of tea.However going back to the survey if the Minister is serious about listening to it then she needs to adopt a Green programme of positive solutions such as a living wage for the parents—there is a thought. If the survey tells us that socio-economic disadvantage is critical one of the ways we help children to get socio-economic advantage is to pay their parents enough money to be able to provide them with the necessaries of life. Then all the programmes about food in schools and all the charitable good works that in the end do not empower people but are necessary for survival at the moment will not be needed because people will be earning a living wage. Another brilliant idea would be to extend the family in-work tax credit to all families so that everybody would have enough to feed those children. There is an idea.We really need to be serious about addressing what the survey has identified. As I said earlier the survey is not the endgame for education and some of the countries that have been ranked really high—the Asian countries—have authoritarian models that are not the best models for our educational success. They do not result in innovation critical thinking and creativity which are needed in the world today as opposed to the world of yesterday. Those countries although ranking highly in the survey are starting to acknowledge that models such as the creative broad curriculum that New Zealand was once famous for are the kinds of models that we need.I think that one of the most vital messages of the survey is early childhood education and that is where we are missing out. We have cut the 100 percent registration requirement and what we are doing to Pacific heritage languages through the Education and Science Committee is a disgrace. It is the opposite of the survey and it is very disappointing.