Brown SimeonSIMEON BROWN (National—Pakuranga): Thank you Mr Chair. Thank you for the opportunity to take a call on the Education (Vocational Education and Training Reform) Amendment Bill at this committee of the whole House stage. I intend to take a few calls on this part being the substantive part in this bill. In the first call I'd like to focus on the New Zealand Institute of Skills and Technology (NZIST) council. In my second contribution I'd like to come back to talk about the Manukau Institute of Technology and concerns which had been raised in the south-east Auckland community. So firstly I'd like to take a call regarding the NZIST council and I think it's important that we as a committee of the whole House understand the mega change that this bill is making to create what will essentially be a mega polytech to take away the regional decision-making from our local polytechs. If we look through the bill what we see is that this bill essentially takes away power from local polytechs to be able to make decisions around courses—where and how they can be—the regional skills mix academic freedom polytechnic governance community involvement cash reserves capital projects. All of these key decision-making roles which are currently made at a local level will be wrapped up into the mega polytech and given decision making by one central body which is the mega polytechnic NZIST council.Kieran McAnulty: Read the new bill. SIMEON BROWN: I have read the bill because I was on the Education and Workforce Committee Mr Kieran McAnulty the list MP from where—nobody actually knows where he comes from because he doesn't really get round—Hon Member: Australia I think.SIMEON BROWN: He's from Australia from that accent that's right.One of the key one of the key issues that I'd like to raise and I'd like the Minister of Education to be able to provide some clarity over is around what seems to be a conflict in the power that the NZIST council has to appoint members to its student and staff advisory committees. Now this power comes under sections 222L and 222M of new Part 15A set out in clause 49. They have the ability under those sections to be able to essentially appoint the members who will then be the membership of the advisory committee. So it says there that when appointing the members they've got the power to do so. Under section 222L they must establish these advisory council committees.Now if the Minister looks earlier when it comes under section 222G of new Part 15A set out in clause 49 the membership of the NZIST council is made up of at least eight but not more than 12 members one person must be a person who is elected by its staff committee and one person is a member who must be elected by its student committee. The question I have is whether the Minister sees any level of conflict over this appointment process seeing as the Minister will have the power to appoint the remaining members other than the one appointed by the Māori advisory committee. The Minister will have the power to appoint the remaining members of the NZIST council. The NZIST council then has the power to appoint who will sit on the staff committee or the student committee. So essentially what you have is you have a circle of power which all involves the Minister appointing people who will then appoint people whom he wants appointed to the NZIST council. So not only does he have a majority on the NZIST council but he has the ability to appoint people to the staff committee and the student committee who will then appoint representatives who will be in line with what he's after. I want to ask the Minister whether he has any concerns about what seems to be an apparent conflict and whether he has looked at other options at which the staff and the students are able to have their voices heard rather than having what seems to be a very tightly controlled process whereby the Minister essentially retains control.I guess that raises the question over whether that is what the Minister wants. Is the Minister essentially wanting full control over the NZIST council where there is no delegation down to students down to staff down to regions and where he is trying to suck all that power into his office here in Wellington? I think the only thing the Minister said is We won't be having the head office of this NZIST council in Auckland or Wellington." Well I can tell the Minister where the head office will be and it sounds like it's going to be in his Beehive office here in Wellington regardless of where the NZIST council might meet or where the chief executive might go for his daily meetings with his NZIST council. So I'd like the Minister to answer those questions because that's what the regions of New Zealand are worried about. That's the concern they're raising up and down our country—the control that the Minister is having."