Kaye NikkiHon NIKKI KAYE (National—Auckland Central): I am very pleased to stand and speak to this piece of legislation. The first thing I'd like to say is I actually agree with the last comments of the Minister whereby he talked about the value of the profession and I think many members in this House will remember fondly the impact that their teachers have made in their life but where we want to disagree with the member is that we also respect history and I want that member to go back and read the workforce advisory report and the report around the convicted sex offender that led to the changes that the previous Government made around the Education Council. I went back and had two reads actually of the report and I want to quote some things back to that member because what he could've done—what he could have done—is come to the Opposition and had a conversation in terms of the composition of the council. We did not have that from the Minister. We didn't have that reflection on history.I want to remind him of who was on that workforce advisory group—John Morris Pauline Winter—and that report was very powerful in terms of what it said and the reason that we had the change to a composition skills-based body. It was really clear: now is the time for industrial advocacy organisations to back the support for the establishment of an independent body capable of self-regulation and self-review. That's why we ended up in the situation where we created this independent body so that we could have and resolve—there were significant financial issues. There were issues around regulation. There were issues around review. That report goes through these significant issues.That's why we made the changes and what the Minister could've done is come to the Opposition and said Let's have that conversation in terms of elected members versus a composition of a skills-based approach." But we didn't have that. So what we now have is a Minister that spends several minutes talking about the name change of this organisation and this is his priority rather than recognising that the whole reason the body was created was to reflect that significant piece of work done by John Morris and people like Pauline Winter.The second point I want to make today is that this is a case where it's typical Labour Party. We are seeing an increase of this body to 13 members. I do want to acknowledge though that the member has kept the fact that there is not going to be all of the body elected. That is a positive move. I do want to acknowledge the fact that the member has also ensured that this body retains its statutory independence.But I want also to take a moment to say: why would the member fix something that is not broken? We have had to bail out the Teachers Council under the previous Government. We've had to make these changes. But I want to acknowledge Graham Stoop and the member did acknowledge the existing Education Council. They are doing a fantastic job. They have proceeded in terms of the code of ethics and responsibility.That work has happened. In fact I just had a look at a number of their reports. They've submitted on a range of pieces of Government policy. They have had I think over 2000 submissions. They're doing incredible work and they're doing incredible work because they are focused on what is good leadership what is good governance and what is also good education policy. Again they are born out of a significant piece of work that says the previous Teachers Council got into financial difficulty didn't have the ability to self-regulate to properly self-review and that's how we ended up with this body.We on this side do not believe the Government has made the case for this new composition via elected members. We think there was a significant piece of work done including involving what was a convicted sex offender to lead to the changes for the Education Council that we now have. We do not see the case in terms of spending more when you've got precious education funds on expanding the body to 13. We also think that the existing Education Council have proved that they are doing a stellar job by the engagement that they've had.Finally I do want to address again comments by the Minister. He's made the point that they are consulting around fees in terms of teachers. The point that I would make to the Minister which he does understand—and if he was listening he would acknowledge it—is that the previous Government has had to bail out the Teachers Council. That is one of the reasons why we are in this situation and the reason why we now have this situation where teachers' fees may be going up is that the last Government had to put in a significant amount of funding. I think that when we go out there and we talk as we all do on the hustings to nurses and to doctors we should have a little bit of equality here. We should have a body that is able to fund itself and that is part of the reason why we ended up making the governance changes moving to a skills- and competency-based type of model. And I do think finally that it is incredibly telling that this is the piece of legislation that we have from the Minister first up off the bat.We don't have clarity around national standards. We don't have clarity around what's happening with the decile system. We have a whole group of children in partnership schools that have not a frickin' clue about what their futures are. Instead the Minister spends several minutes talking about the name change of a particular bill. In my view—and I will go back to the beginning of his speech if we want to talk about education priorities—it's this side of the House that cares about some of our most disadvantaged kids in partnership schools. It's this side of the House that cares about having financial viability. It's this side of the House that wants an Education Council that has skills- and competency-based members. And to have the Minister as his first piece of legislation be dealing with this rather than some of the bigger issues in education is I think disappointing.Finally I do just want to acknowledge all of the teachers in New Zealand and also make the point that this isn't about this side of the House not valuing input. In fact actually the previous Minister through the appointments process had significant engagement as I understand it to ensure that we had a number of registered teachers on this Education Council. So I want to acknowledge what the previous Minister has done in that regard. Thank you."