Stanford EricaERICA STANFORD (National—East Coast Bays): Thank you Madam Deputy Speaker. I'm really pleased that my bill was drawn. I am proud of the work that the National Party have done in this area and I am proud of this bill.The decile system is a very outdated mechanism to deliver funding to our most disadvantaged students. It's a blunt tool. Look to be fair it's probably the best thing that we could have come up with at the time with the data that we had. But we now have access to data and information that can more accurately target funding to those students in schools who are most at risk of not achieving. The decile system we have is basically pretty much based purely on household income and we know now—we have access to information that tells us—that this is not the best indicator to tell us whether or not a child is going to achieve at school. There are many more complex factors that will determine that and we know what they are. We know that by taking into account a wide range of indicators that we can weight we can determine a child's risk of not achieving. We know where these kids are and we know that we can target them. If we have the ability to more accurately target funding to the right kid at the right time in the right place why would we not do it? Why would we carry on with a decile system that is flawed and that stigmatises schools—because people automatically think that low decile equals a poor school and we know that that's not true.It's widely recognised in this House that it's a flawed system. I think from all of the speeches tonight we all agree that something needs to be done and here we have a bill that gives us a better way of doing things. We can break cycles. We can see futures turned around because on this side of the House this party believes in smart approaches in doing the things that work. This bill will do just that—while protecting privacy Jenny Salesa if you'd read the bill—by eliminating the stigma associated with decile.I would like to thank Chlöe Swarbrick for meeting with me about my bill and also Tracey Martin both of whom met with me to discuss the bill. Chlöe Swarbrick even paid for lunch—after she told me she wouldn't be supporting the bill. That just leaves Mr Hipkins who said—to be fair—that he would meet with me and who is currently in the middle of summits on education to hear everyone's views—to be inclusive" to have "conversations" to use the words du jour of the Labour Party.The summits the inclusiveness the conversations the open and transparent Government the cross-party collaboration reaching across the political divide—all of these words and phrases sound so amazing and warm and fuzzy and inclusive. That's what this Government would like you to believe that they're doing but unfortunately these are only words; the reality is very different.The very first occasion Minister Hipkins has to do some of these things—to reach across the divide to talk with someone about education about my bill a complex technical bill that affects every school in New Zealand and thousands of disadvantaged kids—the very first opportunity he has to discuss it what does he do? He ignores my repeated requests to meet to discuss my bill. Silence nothing nada not a peep—until the night before the first reading of the bill he sends me a letter with a memo saying he's not going to support the bill. And look I sound surprised. I sound surprised that all of this has happened but I shouldn't be. I shouldn't be surprised. In fact this reminds me of a quote from one of my favourite movies Aladdin where Iago says "Why am I not surprised? I may have a heart attack and die from not surprise!" because that's how I'm feeling today. It's 100 percent in line with everything the Minister has done.Let's take charter schools. It fits his modus operandi completely. He refuses to meet with them—sound familiar? No consultation—sound familiar? He replaces having a conversation with them with a piece of paper a press release announcing that they're going to be closed—sound familiar? This kind of behaviour is exactly what I should have expected. Mr Hipkins kills policy he doesn't like with the stroke of a pen. With my bill it was death by letter at the eleventh hour—no reason. And when he eventually implements the equity index he will take all the credit for all of the work—the good work—that National did. In his mind it's a "my way or the highway" approach and that is very sad for the disadvantaged kids of New Zealand who could be much better off under this bill."