9. Question No. 9—EducationHon NIKKI KAYE (National—Auckland Central) to the Associate Minister of EducationQuestion No. 9—EducationHon NIKKI KAYE (National—Auckland Central): Does she stand by her allocation decisions around learning support coordinators in schools—SPEAKER: Who interjected there? Who made that noise? Mr McClay did you make a noise?Hon Todd McClay: Mr Speaker if I'd made a noise I would have stood up and told you that I did so.SPEAKER: The Hon Nikki Kaye start again.9. Hon NIKKI KAYE (National—Auckland Central) to the Associate Minister of Education: Does she stand by her allocation decisions around Learning Support Coordinators in schools and does she believe they are targeting children who are most in need?Hon TRACEY MARTIN (Associate Minister of Education): Yes I stand by my allocation decisions. The first tranche of 623 learning support coordinators was never going to be able to provide an allocation to all schools. What I was trying to ensure was that all of New Zealand had coverage and that that has been achieved and that this role has the best chance of success. That is why learning support coordinators will be allocated into schools in clusters that are the most advanced in implementing the learning support delivery model in the first instance. To make sure there was a variety of types of schools and settings in this initial allocation the allocation decisions also took into account some specific characteristics of clusters such as the proportion of rural schools and the distance between schools the proportion of Māori and Pasifika students the number of Māori-medium kura in a community and the number of students in a cluster. Learning support needs are part of the diversity of every learning environment. One in five children and young people receives some form of learning support due to disability disadvantage behavioural challenges and not making progress. For example one in seven children has dyslexia. We do not currently have a comprehensive national database on learning support need. I intend that there will be further tranches to progressively roll out the learning support coordinators coverage to all schools.Hon Nikki Kaye: Does she agree with principal Andrew King who said regarding her decisions This is not about the growing needs of children and whānau or our communities growing numbers of complicated needs on SENCO registers. This is about who has opted sooner for the system the ministry wants us to be using. I am lost for words—stunned in fact."Hon TRACEY MARTIN: No I do not. No I do not agree with that principal's comments. If he goes and has a look at the allocation—and shortly I will seek to table the allocation across New Zealand—there are people who are the most advanced in the learning support delivery model there are those who are in the beginning stages there are those who have had initial conversations that are moving forward. I have deliberately attempted to make sure that I can cover as many dimensions and diversity of schools and need for children across New Zealand with the first tranche to make the most substantial changes to learning support we have seen since Special Education 2000.Hon Nikki Kaye: Does she stand by her decisions regarding learning support allocation in the Far North with principals up there saying that they have received hardly any support for children with the most complex needs?Hon TRACEY MARTIN: Yes I do and at the end of this series of questions I will table a map of New Zealand showing the allocation across all of New Zealand. It shows that the majority of New Zealand has been covered: 1000 schools covered by 623 learning support coordinators at a variety of decile levels at a variety of rural urban semi-rural isolated Māori-medium English-medium—as many varieties as I can get I have covered with the number of coordinators that we have.Hon Nikki Kaye: What does she say to principal Gaye Turner who has said "As a principal of a low-decile school who's missed out on a coordinator while the high-decile school up the road was allocated one I don't know how the allocation of these coordinators addresses the issue of equity."Hon TRACEY MARTIN: I would welcome that principal to contact my office directly and I'm happy to go and speak as I have offered in any cluster as I have over the last 12 months spoken about the way that this allocation would be done. I also would point out that when one looks at the numbers around the allocation the majority of those have been allocated to those that are deciles lower than 5. But I would also point out that there are children—one in seven children in this country for example is somewhere on the dyslexia scale. They do not reside in single clusters inside this nation and they deserve to be supported in their education as much as any other child.Hon Grant Robertson: How many of these learning support coordinator positions were funded when she took on the portfolio at the end of 2017?Hon TRACEY MARTIN: At the time I took on the portfolio while the learning support delivery model had been created and was being rolled out under the previous Government there were no learning support coordinator positions factored at that time.Hon Nikki Kaye: I seek leave to table the previous announcement which showed that there were I think 70 learning coordinators under the previous Government.SPEAKER: The member seeks to table that document. Is there any objection? There appears to be none.Document by leave laid on the Table of the House.Hon Nikki Kaye: Will she commit to changing her allocation decisions to ensure that the most disadvantaged children and children with complex needs get the support that they deserve and that there is a more fair and equitable allocation for schools?Hon TRACEY MARTIN: At the time of the original announcement of the $217 million required to provide 600—and I note that we have now stretched that to 623—learning support coordinators it was obvious with 2500 schools that there would not be a learning support coordinator for every school. The member is asking me now to take away from some schools and give to others. That is not what I am going to do because the member is asking around need when she cannot prove when there is no central data collection around need—the member has completely ignored the moderate needs of students across New Zealand those students with dyslexia dyspraxia dyscalculia and on the mild autism spectrum. She has asked me to make a decision based on a criteria that does not exist and so therefore I will not be changing the allocation.SPEAKER: A criterion anyway.Hon Nikki Kaye: I seek leave to table an email by a principal Andrew King to the Minister whereby—SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] Order! The member seeks to table an email—Hon Nikki Kaye: They know what the need is.SPEAKER: Order! Well I'm not going to put it.Hon TRACEY MARTIN: I seek leave to table a map showing where the allocation of the first tranche of learning support coordinators has been placed around New Zealand.SPEAKER: I'd seek an assurance from the Minister that that map is not otherwise available as part of any Ministry of Education documentation online.Hon TRACEY MARTIN: To the best of my knowledge I had it created for me but I'm happy to go and check that and seek leave at another time.SPEAKER: Well what I'll do is I'll put the leave on the basis that it is an originally created document. We won't table it. If the Minister comes back to me and says that it's not then that's solved; otherwise she'll table it by the end of the day. Right a further supplementary? No. [Interruption] Oh is there any objection to that? There better not be. There appears to be none.Document by leave laid on the Table of the House."