Donnelly Brian: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
Donnelly Brian: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
[Volume:623;Page:18287] 
Hon BRIAN DONNELLY (NZ First) 
: 
 Yesterday this House took time to reflect on the tsunami tragedy and the awful human suffering that the power of nature wrought on Boxing Day. But let us spare a thought for those who have daily confronted the horrific spectacle—the sights and the smells—to enable us in the comfort of our living rooms to gain some insight into the magnitude of that tragedy. I refer of course to members of the media—reporters such as Charlotte Glennie the camera crews and many others. I hope their bosses comprehend the trauma these people have in terms of witnessing the carnage and devastation on a daily basis for weeks on end. 
Compare that meritorious devotion to duty with the bizarre behaviour of locally based media in the week leading up to the Orewa speech. For a week we had the surreal spectacle of the media analysing dissecting and proclaiming professional judgment upon what Don Brash was going to say before he had even delivered the speech. It was bizarre. We entered the twilight zone of political commentary. It was like a week before going to the dentist having someone telling one every day what the dentist was going to do to one! After all of that the only excitement generated was the sacking of Katherine Rich. 
I met up with my mate John Carter at Whangarei Airport yesterday coming down here and I said to him flippantly: “You’d better hope your boss doesn’t decide to do an Orewa III speech and make the topic defence.” How little I realised that my statement was prophetic. Every member of the National caucus with a spokesperson’s role must live in fear and trepidation that Don Brash’s next speech will be in his or her portfolio area. What does one do? One either concurs with dopey policy or gets sacked by lunchtime. 
There has been considerable comment recently on the amount of parental contribution towards schooling. Considerable heat has been generated but there has been no in-depth analysis of the issue. The political spin is that because locally raised funds have increased—and that includes parents’ fees and donations foreign fee-paying students’ costs fund-raising activities such as galas corporate and trust sponsorship leasing of property and buildings etc.—that is proof of the proposition that Government is under-funding our schools. Such a conclusion is simply not logical. If a Government doubled the amount it gave to schools parents would still want to raise funds and principals would still do everything possible to maximise resources available to students. 
During the 1980s I was principal of a rural area school. Most of the parents were farming folk and were always willing to roll up their shirtsleeves for working bees and fund-raising activities. The principal of Howick Intermediate visited our school and told me that his parents would not roll up their shirtsleeves but they were more than willing to open their chequebooks. Are we going to ban parents from opening their chequebooks? If we do then we are also going to have to ban gala days raffles mystery envelopes batons up and a host of other fund-raising activities. I find the donation of $750 requested by an Auckland boys’ school to be offensive. But if the parents are willing to pay that who am I to say they should not do so? Therefore the question should be asked: are the parents making this donation voluntarily? Is the school in breach of its legal obligations through bringing pressure on the parents by way of threatening to withdraw opportunities from their children? If there is a concern it is this: if parents feel they are being pressurised where do they go? It is no good going to the board of trustees. They have already set those policies. The parents will not get any sympathy from boards of trustees. 
So I am calling on the Government to complete the original design of Tomorrow’s Schools and to establish a parents advocacy council. Because if parents know of their legal obligations and their legal rights and there is a mechanism to remedy any over-enthusiasm by schools which is what a parents advocacy council could do if we seriously think about it that is about as far as policy can go unless we are prepared to ban school fund-raising of any sort. 
As for the vexed question of whether schools are being underfunded let us just say that it costs a whole lot more to deliver a computerised curriculum than it does to do so via chalk and a blackboard. This Government in fact tells everybody it is giving enough to schools to deliver the curriculum via chalk and a blackboard and so therefore it is giving them enough. 
I finish by saying that the only time there has been a major increase in funding for schools through the operational grant has been in 1997 and 1998 when New Zealand First was able to loosen National’s purse strings and provide some funding for the additional costs that schools were incurring in this modern world.