Peachey Allan: Education Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Peachey Allan: Education Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:630;Page:2656] 
ALLAN PEACHEY (National—Tamaki) 
: 
 I rise once again to oppose the Education Amendment Bill and to speak to Part 2. Part 2 as previous speakers have said is a nuts and bolts part but it is actually very important. It is important to repeal outdated legislation and to revoke regulations that are no longer relevant. Some of us in this Chamber particularly those of us on this side are of the view that much more legislation could be repealed that many more regulations could be revoked and that New Zealand schooling would be the better for it. Sometimes it is fanciful to contemplate what schooling would look like if we got rid of 85 percent of the legislation that affects schools. 
But I think the more serious point is that this amendment bill takes as its principal Act the Education Act 1989. It is with great sadness that I observe that Parliament did not hold its nerve and stick with the 1989 Act and give it a chance to work. It could not resist the pressure from bureaucracies and interest groups to interfere to regulate and to control. This bill is just one more step in that process. It is one more step that says that centralisation is how we solve the underlying problems of education. 
Well I have to make clear to the Government that I am not aware of one child anywhere who has learnt anything in the office of a bureaucrat a Minister a politician or a review officer. Children learn in classrooms. I think that those of us who were principals—and my New Zealand First colleague was one as well—in the years straight after 1989 in the era of Tomorrow’s Schools were fortunate. They were years when we could actually make a difference. We were genuine educational leaders and those of us who had the courage to seize the opportunity to be innovative creative and brave transformed schools. 
But increasingly as more and more legislation came out of the House and more and more regulations came out of the ministry we suddenly realised we were not being creative and innovative in finding solutions for children’s learning needs; we were becoming obsessed with compliance and with ticking the right box. Our teachers suddenly began to work it out—take no risks be safe comply get a tick from the Education Review Office and it would be all right. It did not matter whether children were learning to the maximum of their capacity because teachers just had to get the right boxes ticked and it would be all right. All this legislation is taking us to an obsession with process—get the process right and nothing else matters. It does not matter that maybe 15 or 20 percent of children are not experiencing success at school. Teachers will not be criticised for that if they get the right boxes ticked. That is where the successive bits of legislation that have been coming out of Parliament since 1989 have led us. 
Let us contemplate for a moment what the schooling scene would look like if we could wipe away everything that has happened in the last 16 years and go back to the purity of the 1989 Education Act—to the vision and plan of Tomorrow’s Schools. Let us just think about what it would look like. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: Part 2. 
ALLAN PEACHEY 
: Thank you Mr Chairman. 
Hon Brian Donnelly 
: You have just used up your title speech. 
ALLAN PEACHEY 
: I am afraid they are not letting me have another speech; I have to get it all into this one. The reference in Part 1 to the Education Standards Act 2001 is a typical example of the type of legislation I am referring to. It is legislation that gets in the way of what really needs to happen. If the Government is to bring in an amendment bill then let us do the job properly.