Ghahraman GolrizGOLRIZ GHAHRAMAN (Green): Thank you Madam Speaker. I come to this bill the Education and Training Amendment Bill (No 3) to express the support of the Green Party of Aotearoa not as the education spokesperson but having been—Hon Member: To school?GOLRIZ GHAHRAMAN: —the education spokesperson—and to school—last term I know that this is a dense sector. There is a lot to be considered at every level from early childhood right up to the end of high school and tertiary. There are unions there are teachers principals and young people and their families all with a great stake in the way that we run our education system. I do want to commend the Education and Workforce Committee who heard submissions on this bill. I know that that would have been hard work there would have been a lot to consider and it sounds like they have done that work and they listened carefully to what came. But I also know that in terms of making any system fair there is a need sometimes to lift the voices and interests of those who are more systemically marginalised to give effect to what we want in terms of substantive equality.I think that that's where the division has occurred in this House today: the idea that the majority rules or that at some point we will stop and we will recognise that there are groups that have been underrepresented and that underrepresentation actually makes our decisions weaker. Any governance body's decisions will be weaker if that governance body does not have the benefit of the lived experiences perspectives and challenges of groups who are not the majority who are experiencing particular challenges that would not come to the minds of a majority member of that community—a status quo member of that community; someone who's not facing those challenges. And that's what comes to mind with the decision to require school boards to be more representative of their communities.Of course principals and other board members will want to be fair and just to a disabled young person attending their school but the idea that they would automatically know what that looks like is just wrong. We know that; we are a House of Representatives. We know that when people fought for representation of women in here for example it wasn't the case that we thought men were going to deliberately make decisions that were poor for women but the fact remains that only a woman in New Zealand will know what the challenges look like for us as we access the healthcare system the roads the justice system and in this case the education system.So whether that is to say that a community who has a constituent who is from a migrant background migrants of colour will experience the school system differently—Māori will experience the school system differently; girls will experience the school system differently; queer students and their whānau will experience the school system differently; and of course so will disabled and chronically ill students and their whānau. To say that we will just take care of that we'll just automatically know what that looks like well that's been dispelled surely many years ago in particular for a House such as this a House of Representatives. That's why we hear submissions actually because we know that we don't know everything. So to have a decision-making body a governing body be more representative can only mean that its decisions will be far more sustainable far more cognisant of not only challenges but also the benefits that may come to different groups in different ways. It's something that should be commended and replicated across New Zealand. So for that reason I do commend the bill.But I do also want to just touch on a couple of other things. I'm surprised that in the early childhood index data area of this bill that wasn't already the case. I think it's also commendable to say that the ministry will be able to form better policy—again more sustainable policy; more representative policy—for having more reliable substantive data in that early childhood sector. We know that early childhood education is of absolute paramount importance and it hasn't always received the type of attention and emphasis that it deserves. I say that both in terms of the pay grade of those who work in that sector but also in terms of it seems as this bill highlights collecting actual data of what's happening in that sector what we need to invest in and the decisions that will come down the line will absolutely be stronger for having that data.I won't go on for much longer having not sat in that select committee process but I do believe that any time this House comes together to actually share what we know will strengthen governance bodies will strengthen representative decision-making and to ensure that we don't just leave it up to chance that those voices are heard and those interests are protected in public policy but that we make sure of that is good lawmaking. So I do commend this bill to the House.