Power Simon: Education (Export Education Levy) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Power Simon: Education (Export Education Levy) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:614;Page:10649] 
SIMON POWER (National—Rangitikei) 
: 
 One of the disappointing things about the last 4 to 5 weeks has been the fact that I have not been able to sit on the Education and Science Committee and have an opportunity to listen to the organisations the New Zealand Qualifications Authority and my personal favourite the Tertiary Education Commission when they come before that committee to discuss issues of competency but more particularly to provide a check on the activity or inactivity of those organisations with regard to issues like this. 
 Bill English and Brian Donnelly both hit the nail square on the head when they said to the Minister that what should be done in this situation is to get the New Zealand Qualifications Authority the Tertiary Education Commission and—while he is at it—the New Zealand Teachers Council into his office and say to those three organisations that they are all useless. Part of the problem that we are facing with this bill is the fact that the New Zealand Qualifications Authority and the Tertiary Education Commission—as long suspected by this member—have been so caught up in the big-picture philosophical architectural design in their own minds of how they want to see the education system at a tertiary level develop that they have missed doing their core business. Their core business is to ensure that the quality of the education coming out of those institutions meets a certain marker and more particularly that the money invested on behalf of the taxpayer in those organisations is protected monitored and audited to the point that taxpayers know that their money is safe. 
I know—because the Minister has admitted as much in question time in the House under questioning with regard to the Teachers Council—that it has problems. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: Fewer problems than it had a couple of months ago. 
SIMON POWER 
: Let us hope so. The fact is that the New Zealand Qualifications Authority has been hopeless. Every time the New Zealand Qualifications Authority appeared before the select committee when I was on it for a short time matters just went from bad to worse. In fact Brian Donnelly who chairs that committee will recall that we had to haul the New Zealand Qualifications Authority back before the committee after we had looked at transcripts of descriptions of activity that they had given the committee because it turned out that they were completely wrong. We had to recall the New Zealand Qualifications Authority to the committee put it under the gun again and ask the questions a second time. 
I say to the Minister of Education that the thing that concerns me most about all of this is that I know that Minister knows that the New Zealand Qualifications Authority is not doing its job properly. So why not line the New Zealand Qualifications Authority up in his office and take to it? Mr Ogilvy says that it is the institutions that will be penalised but that is just not right. It is the students who will be penalised when the levy comes in because all that will happen is that the cost will be passed to the users of the institution. I know that members want students to have a quality education but the reality is that this bill is misguided in that regard. 
I would bet money that the Tertiary Education Commission is a can of worms waiting to be opened. I am envious of my colleague the Hon Bill English getting to sit on the Education and Science Committee when the Tertiary Education Commission comes before it. I am tempted to do a deal with Dr Wayne Mapp to see whether I can get on there for the day. I tell members that that organisation might have the lofty ideals clear in its mind that Steve Maharey has imparted to it but it does not have the operational aspects of the tertiary education system locked down at all. The Tertiary Education Commission is just another New Zealand Qualifications Authority waiting to happen when it comes to dealing with those institutions—the way they are funded the charters and profiles and the way in which the operational matters occur. 
I have said it before and I will say it again. The place leaks like a sieve and that is a sure sign that all is not well there. I say to Trevor Mallard that if he really wants to look after international students and if it is their welfare that he is most concerned about then he should direct the energy at the institutions that should be monitoring and auditing those providers rather than just picking off the private providers and saying that they will carry the burden and the cost. 
 We have seen it happen when regional polytechnics have not met the grade. What happened in those cases? Well the big cheques were written and I have to say—[ 
Interruption 
] I tell Ms Coddington that that is right. I have to say that when decisions in legislation are based purely on the difference between whether an institution is owned publicly or privately—regardless of the quality of the education being provided regardless of the type of management and governance structures in place regardless of the accountability those institutions should have to the departments that should be monitoring them—I would ask whether we should not apply the same standard to all institutions including those institutions and Government departments that should be monitoring the use and expenditure of taxpayers’ money. 
We on this side of the House know that it is actually the New Zealand Qualifications Authority—and I am willing to bet the Tertiary Education Commission—that should be under the gun here. Those are the institutions that have failed international students as much as the institutions themselves that allegedly provided the education. As I said earlier I know that the Minister of Education knows that. It seems to me that the quickest most effective least political way of dealing with this problem is to deal with those institutions that should be monitoring and watching these providers. I am just not convinced that the New Zealand Qualifications Authority is anything more than a bumbling group of bureaucrats who are unable to see anything past scraping through the next financial review before the Education and Science Committee. Those New Zealand— 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: I am sure that’s not the major focus. 
SIMON POWER 
: I tell the Minister that it should be because the New Zealand Qualifications Authority is the organisation that should be here and in the gun. I say that that is where the focus of this bill should be and that it seems to me that to punish those private institutions that are doing well will actually end up punishing the students that this Government most wishes to help. When we look at the figures and statistics of course it is Maori who most often take up their tertiary education through private providers and it seems to me that it is Maori who will suffer as a result of increased costs taxes and levies being put on these institutions. 
Those costs will be passed to those students and in that instance it is they who will be put off entering tertiary education providers. It is they who deserve the New Zealand Qualifications Authority to be doing its job in a way they know that hard-earned money saved or borrowed through the student loan scheme will provide those students with an asset to improve their lot and the lot of their families into the future. It is those organisations—the New Zealand Qualifications Authority and the Tertiary Education Commission—that should be in the gun here not the institutions or the students those institutions wish to serve. 
DEBORAH CODDINGTON (ACT) 
: 
 The ACT party will be opposing this amendment bill. The Minister of Education talks about export education as if we were talking about cattle being fattened for beef. He seems to forget that we are actually talking about human beings in this legislation and the fact that people come to New Zealand because of the choice that is available. This new tax—because that is what it is; it is an excuse for this Government to impose another tax on people—is another tax on private providers. What did the Hon Brian Donnelly say? There have been 19 new taxes so far and this is yet another. [ 
Interruption 
] We know we are winning the argument when members opposite resort to personal attacks because they cannot even defend their own policies any more. Do members know why they cannot defend their own policies? It is because their policies are totally indefensible. 
This legislation reduces choice and it reduces flexibility for students. As Simon Power said—and he was quite right—the majority of students who choose private providers are Maori and Pacific Island students because they like the flexibility that private providers offer them. They are often young women who have left school had babies and want to return to the workforce and the part-time courses in terms of night classes and 6-week classes—instead of the 3-year classes that the public institutions force them to take—are a lot more attractive. 
Simon Power was also absolutely right when he talked about bureaucracy building. This is another way for this Government to get more taxes to build bureaucracies. The New Zealand Qualifications Authority is expanding. He talked about the Teachers Council. The Teachers Council is known in the education sector as just a post office. It takes in the applications for teachers it takes them out of an envelope it puts them in another envelope it sends them off to the police they come back and the council collects $10 on the way. 
There have been several changes in the head of the Teachers Council since it was set up. It is still not even coping with the work it is required to do and the latest letter that went out to the education sector naming the new head of the Teachers Council said in addition that it would continue to advertise the position on an ongoing basis. So at least the council has accepted that it cannot hold anyone there for long. The Minister should get his bureaucrats in and get them to be accountable. 
We also see in this explanatory note of the bill that this export education is a sustainable green export. That is just cant total cant and this Government knows that. It is totally pathetic. Why should the public sector not be held accountable when it fails? A hundred million dollars of taxpayers’ money has been poured into polytechs to bail them out when they fail but instead of punishing the private providers that make mistakes this Government decides to punish everybody. That is the culture of this Government that we see all the time. If a child gets beaten to death let us ban smacking. If one or two education institutions fail let us tax all of them. 
The Association of Private Providers of English Language put out a very good question and answer thing today in which it addressed the issues. The association asked a very important question: “Did the Minister consult?”. This Minister is very proud of the fact that he consults. He sends me nice little friendly emails saying that he does front up and he does consult. He has not learnt to find the caps key yet but he is a slow learner in his own words. But did the Minister consult? The Minister announced that private training establishments would pay for the refunds given to students of the Modern Age Institute of Learning on 8 September without consulting the industry at all. He did not even go to the industry. He came out and announced it. 
The Modern Age Institute of Learning closed because of bad management but there was bad management in the New Zealand Qualifications Authority as well. The authority was not keeping a good watch on the institute. It found serious problems in September 2001 and again in February 2003 and most of the problems were still there in August 2003 but they were mainly due to lack of systems and poor implementation. Why did the bureaucrats not step in then? 
Debate interrupted.