Smith Lockwood: State Sector Amendment Bill (No 3) — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee Third Reading 
Smith Lockwood: State Sector Amendment Bill (No 3) — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:616;Page:12180] 
Dr the Hon LOCKWOOD SMITH (National—Rodney) 
: 
 Part 2 of the State Sector Amendment Bill (No 3) is really the heart of this legislation. In this part clause 4 gives the State Services Commissioner all the rights duties and powers under the Employment Relations Act during the period of collective agreement negotiations. This is all about big Government big unions and forget the children. 
If I am wrong in that assertion why does the Government not provide the opportunity for it to be tested? For schools it owns for State schools in the State monopoly the Government will require that the boards of trustees totally abrogate their responsibilities during negotiation of teachers’ pay and conditions—teachers are meant to be the employees of the boards but we will forget that for the moment. Let us allow that the Government wants to do that. But if that is so right and if that will produce such good outcomes in terms of rewarding our best teachers as they should be rewarded and providing the opportunity for poor teachers—and there are plenty of them—to be dismissed under appropriate arrangements why not give the choice to schools? If the Government is right why not allow some schools to say that no they actually want to negotiate with their own teachers? Why not open things up to absolutely fair competition for ideas? If centralised control where one size fits all and Big Brother Government controls the lot and the big teacher union on the other side controls all the teachers is so good let it be tested. Let the Government provide real choice for parents by funding children who go to schools the Government does not own in the same manner as it funds children going to schools it does own. 
Let us see which way parents choose to go. I would bet with every last dollar I had that we would see parents rushing out the doors of the great State monopoly into schools where skilled teachers were rewarded into schools that could employ the best and into schools that could get rid of teachers who were not performing. That is my challenge to Minister Wilson who has taken over from the Minister of Education in the chair: if this idea of total centralised control is so good then the Government should allow choice. If the Government believes that it is such a good model it should allow real choice. It should fund all children the same. When I say the same if they are from poor backgrounds then OK fund them more; if their need is greater fund them more but let their parents choose which school they go to. That ought to be the test of what is right. If what the Government is doing here is so right let parents choose. We know of course that parents would leave the great State monopoly in their droves under this legislation if they had real choice. 
That is at the heart of this; this big nanny Labour Government thinks it knows best and treats the public with contempt. We saw it with the foreshore and seabed issue. There was no consultation with the wider public; the only consultation was with iwi. It is such arrogance! The public is saying that it has had a gutsful of it. I say to the Minister in the chair Margaret Wilson that if she believes she is so right—she was Minister of Labour—if she believes that this kind of employment arrangement is so right I accept that she may be right but she should give parents the chance to decide whether they want this big State control and big union control. If she really believes in education for children she should give parents the choice.