Yang JianEducation SectorDr JIAN YANG (Chairperson of the Education and Science Committee): I would like to firstly acknowledge the former education Minister Hekia Parata for her great contribution to our education improvement and also to enhancing the student achievement in this country. The Hon Hekia Parata worked tirelessly and she was deeply committed to improving our education system and to improving our student achievement. I would also like to acknowledge or congratulate the new education Minister the Hon Nikki Kaye. I have worked with the Hon Nikki Kaye on a number of projects. I am confident that the Hon Nikki Kaye will be a very capable very committed education Minister. As the chair of the Education and Science Committee I look forward to working with Minister Nikki Kaye.The National Government has steadily increased the funding for education. We understand that education is particularly important to our country and to our young New Zealanders. If we want to have a globally competitive economy we must have a globally competitive workforce. That is why education is particularly important. Also education is essential to all young New Zealanders for them to succeed. So we have continually increased funding for all those reasons. Since 2009 we have increased funding substantially—about 35 percent. Our education spending is about $11 billion which is the highest ever—$11 billion. When compared with other OECD countries New Zealand spent the highest percentage on education—the highest percentage of our public spending on education. That is how important education is to us.In terms of our early childhood education (ECE) we have more than doubled our spending there to about $1.8 billion. That is another area—from ECE to primary and secondary education—where we have increased our spending. Of course in terms of tertiary education we are also working hard in that area. In terms of per child ECE spending actually we are amongst the top third of OECD countries.It is not just about how much money we spend; we also pay attention to how we spend the money. We are trying to spend the money in a more innovative and responsible way. For example we started the $394 million Investing in Educational Success initiative in 2014. We are focusing on career paths. We are focusing on sharing best practice. We are focusing on enhancing student achievement. So it is not just how much but also how we spend the money. Also we now have about 197 communities of learning involving well over a half million students and 184 early learning services and also about 1600 schools plus four tertiary education providers. So they are working collaboratively trying to share best practice and also to enhance our student achievement.So what are the results? First of all we must say that we now have more students achieving the minimum qualification for success. That means that these students are able to either go to university for further study or to find a job. So this is a very substantial achievement. Basically in the year 2016 about 85 percent of our students achieved the minimum—NCEA level 2. That is a substantial increase from 2011 about a 10.9 percent increase since 2011. So that again is a very major achievement. That means actually that since 2011 21000 more students achieved NCEA level 2. And with Pasifika and Māori achievement it is more impressive. In—[Bell rung]