Flavell Te Ururoa: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Flavell Te Ururoa: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 14 August 2012. Volume:682;Page:4341. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
TE URUROA FLAVELL (Maori Party—Waiariki) 
: 
 Tena koe Mr Chair. Kia ora tatou katoa. Last week there was the International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples which probably passed most of us by so I want to reflect in my contribution to this debate on a statement out of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. I am talking about article 14 which states that “Indigenous peoples have the right to establish and control their educational systems and institutions providing education in their own languages in a manner appropriate to their cultural methods of teaching and learning.” and that we “have the right to all levels and forms of education … without discrimination.” 
So you would understand that against that background and with Pita Sharples as Associate Minister of Education we are relatively comfortable and actually quite happy with the amount of money we are able to secure in respect of advancing Maori education. What I am talking about is a couple of areas in Budget 2012. Firstly there is $76 million specifically targeted at Maori education. There is a particular focus on early childhood education with an emphasis on Te Reo Maori and tikanga Maori—$35 million all up. In another area it is targeting resources $8.5 million to support learners to achieve National Certificate of Educational Achievement—in particular in Maori-medium education. Finally the other procurement we got was a massive $33 million for teaching leadership and curriculum focus to accelerate the achievement of Maori learners. 
That is all pretty fantastic from our point of view—in particular from a Maori Party perspective and being in an agreement with the National Government—because these gains are for our whanau through education. But I do want to sound one particular warning and it is specifically focused on the 95 percent of young Maori students who are in a general-stream school. Education of our tamariki in those mainstream schools we believe is very much a priority that we should pretty much focus on. Of course the Minister of Education Hekia Parata has been upfront I suggest about demanding excellence and requiring accountability and in some forums has actually copped a lot of flak for her particular stand. From my perspective her intentions I think are honourable. But we need to see the difference. We need to see the difference that it is going to make in terms of young Maori learners. 
One of the things that the Maori Party did try to advance is a kaupapa called Tataiako which is all about cultural competency and setting some standards for teachers to achieve that they need to develop in order to engage Maori learners to achieve at the very highest level. It has not been rolled all the way out as yet but we are hoping that it will achieve that. The key point about Tataiako is that it was developed to help all educators think about what it takes to successfully teach Maori learners. It is not a responsibility that any educator we believe should shirk or refer on to the Maori teachers to deliver. We expect that action and accountability must come from all of our educators. We must see action because for far too long we have been talking about a lot of initiatives without too much movement in respect of achievement levels. Too many staff in schools I believe have got Ka Hikitia in their right hands but have wrapped it up in cellophane and it has never been opened. Although we might have the strategy we actually have not moved towards implementing it in a strong way to address the kaupapa of Ka Hikitia at its very heart. 
If the Education Review Office is charged with holding schools to account then we would expect to see it have much more transparency around the schools that deliver and the schools that are clearly failing to make a difference. We must do that. Although there is a mechanism within the Education Review Office an accountability mechanism it sort of stops there because nothing is taken on. The  
Promoting Success for Maori Students: Schools’ Progress 
 study which was recently published surveyed 287 schools from full primary to secondary school level and the data showed clearly that sustained Maori underachievement was basically a part of our education system. The report found that a substantial number of schools did not review their own performance in relation to Maori achievement did not make effective use of the data to improve programmes and did not conduct research about students’ learning. Is it that they do not really care or is it that they just do not know what to do? Well whatever it is it is not good enough and from our perspective from the Maori Party perspective we need to do it far better. I suppose that is why—