Rich Katherine: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
Rich Katherine: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
[Volume:640;Page:10409] 
KATHERINE RICH (National) 
: 
 I rise to speak on education in this debate and although I am not very good at joke-telling I have to relate a particular joke that is doing the rounds of Opposition corridors at the moment. It is: what does Steve Maharey have in common with Corporal Apiata? The answer is that they are both going to take on VC roles very soon. 
If we look at the estimates this Minister has put in place we are shown that his focus has not been on the education portfolio. His focus has been on finding additional vocational opportunities for himself as opposed to dealing with some of the tough issues relating to truancy problems with student behaviour in classrooms poor academic attainment and problems with literacy and numeracy. 
We have to go only as far as the early childhood education sector to realise why this Minister is seeking other vocational opportunities in the tertiary sector rather than concentrating on fixing early childhood education problems. We need look only at the Government’s 20 hours free policy which was touted and promoted in July 2005 with all the fanfare and fervour of the election. The Government started off by saying that all 3 and 4-year-old children would be receiving 20 free hours come July 7 but what was presented to and discussed at our select committee was something quite different—only a fraction of 3 and 4-year-olds were to receive free early childhood education. The numbers started to slip and slide and slither around from “definitely” 86000 children to “nearly” that number and then we heard that “perhaps” 92000 would have access. But on this side of the Chamber we understand totally that there is a difference between having access and actually receiving free education. So when the numbers were rolled out in July the reality was quite different and we saw that 27000 3 and 4-year-olds had no place to go. 
There was the interesting story of a guy who searched around in Auckland for a centre in his area. He found one that was providing 20 free hours but the waiting list was 3½ years long. Most parents plan their children with some forethought but I do not know a single parent in New Zealand who would think to put his or her child down for 20 hours free 6 months before that child was conceived. It is just utterly ridiculous. 
Then we saw the moving feast in relation to how much parents would actually save from this policy. The Prime Minister told parents it would be $90 a week. The Minister in the chair Steve Maharey has started to use the figure of $60 a week and today in the House he would not explain the big gap in those figures. But then we heard the view of New Zealand Kindergartens that its parents would save less than $20 a week. Once again we see the difference between the puff the bluster and the weasel words of the election compared with what was actually presented as part of the Budget and reviewed as part of the estimates process. 
A few days before the policy went live we asked how many centres would take it up and the Minister could not say. He could not say how many centres were going to take it up or how many children were going to take it up. Even when we look at the figures that are presented today we cannot bank on those figures because there has been double counting. We have centres on websites reportedly offering the service but then they ring up and say no—they are not providing the service at all. This is an example of how to spend $313 million but actually please nobody. It does not even make a difference to increasing participation rates within our most vulnerable sectors. My colleague Paula Bennett raised the issue of the 10000 forgotten kids who are not in early childhood education at all. This kind of blanket approach does not make one skerrick of difference to those kids who are currently getting nothing at all. 
Within this process we were hoping for some solutions to some of the really important problems in education. For example we asked the Minister to explain why truancy has increased by 41 percent in just the last 4 years. We now have 30000 kids each week who play hookey from school. Some of those kids will be taking just a day or so off but we have a disturbing growing trend in the number of serial and long-term truants who are not learning because they are not at school. So there is nothing for them. There is nothing to deal with the disturbing and challenging behaviours that our teachers are facing on a daily basis. It is no wonder that the suspensions and stand-down rates are rocketing. We have seen the Minister come out and make a blanket change to exemptions. He gives no answer to some very difficult issues in education just rhetoric and bluster.