Martin Tracey: Oral Questions — Questions to MinistersText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeMartin Tracey: Oral Questions — Questions to Ministers[Sitting date: 04 May 2016. Volume:713;Page:10753. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]11.TRACEY MARTIN (NZ First) to the Minister for Tertiary Education Skills and Employment: Does he have confidence in the tertiary education sector?Hon STEVEN JOYCE (Minister for Tertiary Education Skills and Employment): Overall yes particularly as the over 730 tertiary education providers in this sector delivered something like 163000 qualifications in 2014 up 31000 on 2008 including 29000 Bachelor’s degrees up 4500 on 2008. I am also confident that the monitoring agencies for the sector are now more robustly investigating any concerns than at any time in its history.Tracey Martin: What action if any has his Government taken to remove fraudulent and corrupt education agents in countries such as India since this issue was raised in oral questions by New Zealand First in December 2015?Hon STEVEN JOYCE: I cannot recall the details of that discussion in December 2015 but I am likely to have told the member that there have been a number of changes over the last few years. The most recent one has been the requirements for the International English Language Testing System in India. There has been significant work done to monitor the issues that are periodically raised in some of the countries that international students come from. That is an ongoing job because there are always issues and there are always occasional education agents who do not behave themselves in dealing with New Zealand providers.Tracey Martin: How confident is he in light of the increase in tier one providers able to process visas that all of the 85000-plus international students granted residency since 2008 did so with legal documentation?Hon STEVEN JOYCE: I am not sure that the member is correct. They do not get—Ron Mark: Absolutely correct.Hon STEVEN JOYCE: —granted residency. No there is simply not a case where people get a student visa and it automatically gives them residency. In terms of processing applications applications are processed under the close supervision of Immigration New Zealand. In terms of any details around those visas she might like to put the question down to the Minister of Immigration.Tracey Martin: How he can be confident in the tertiary education sector when his office knows of at least one tertiary institution that had a list entitled “Need to upgrade to pass” resulting in 18 international students being scaled from 32 percent fail to a 50 percent pass?Hon STEVEN JOYCE: If the member would like to put that down in writing to me I would be more than happy to take it up with—[Interruption]Mr SPEAKER: Order! If you want to hear the answer allow the Minister to do so. It was a very general first question that was asked. The Minister is attempting to address it and if he does not have that information I think that on this occasion that is acceptable. Allow the Minister to complete his answer.Hon STEVEN JOYCE: So again for the member if she would like to put down that specific query to me in writing I would be more than happy to address it. The New Zealand Qualifications Authority has for example at any time around 30 to 40 investigations under way. If that is not one of them if she supplies me with the information then I would be more than happy to follow it up.Tracey Martin: How can he have confidence in the tertiary education sector when some providers have instructed teaching staff to not officially record ongoing achievement data for international students so that any changes needed to enable a final pass grade are not evident?Hon STEVEN JOYCE: Again the member is making some fairly gross generalisations and accusations. If she has specific concerns then I invite her to provide the details of those concerns so that they can be properly investigated. That is the process.Tracey Martin: I seek leave to table an email to the Hon Steven Joyce’s office outlining this situation with regard to a tertiary institution.Mr SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] Order! I just need to inform the House of the author of the email and the date.Tracey Martin: The author of the email is a gentleman inside those tertiary providers—I would redact that. The date was the 12th of last month.Mr SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that particular email. Is there any objection? There is none it can be tabled.Document by leave laid on the Table of the House.Tracey Martin: Does the Minister understand that any perception of fraud corruption and exploitation of international students will have long-term negative consequences for both those students and our country and what is he doing about it?Hon STEVEN JOYCE: Yes I am probably acutely aware as I have been the Minister in this area for some time. Although we have been developing and growing that industry we have made a number of changes to the industry over that time. We have introduced for example education performance indicators; performance linked funding; audits by the Tertiary Education Commission; changes made to the Education Amendment Act including the requirement that private training establishments that enrol international students must be signatories to a code of practice; the development of the external evaluation and review system; bringing the Institutes of Technology and Polytechnics of New Zealand under the monitoring of the New Zealand Qualifications Authority—a whole range of things. Those things result in a very robust process. If the member has particular concerns I invite her to provide them.