Hipkins Chris; Dean JacquiEDUCATION AND TRAINING (GRANTS—BUDGET MEASURES) AMENDMENT BILLThird ReadingHon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister of Education): I present a legislative statement on the Education and Training (Grants—Budget Measures) Amendment Bill.SPEAKER: That legislative statement is published under the authority of the House and can be found on the Parliament website.Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: I move That the Education and Training (Grants—Budget Measures) Amendment Bill be now read a third time. This bill is a very simple bill and it allows us to deliver on a commitment that the Government made at the last election to deliver pay parity for early childhood education teachers working in education and care services outside of the kindergarten sector. We have made the commitment over this term of Government to ensure that we reach the point where teachers working in those services are paid the equivalent of their counterparts working in kindergartens. The pay gap that has opened up between education and care teachers and teachers in kindergartens—over a decade now—is wrong. It is unacceptable. Why did it happen? It happened because between 2008 and 2017 there were not adjustments to the per child per hour funding rate for education and care services to reflect the pay increases that were being given to kindergarten teachers—none not one at all during that nine-year period—and as a result we saw quite a significant pay differential open up. Under our Government we have given annual funding increases in terms of the per child per hour funding rate including to the salary component of that funding rate every year that we have been in Government but we recognise that that is not enough to undo the damage that was done during that nine-year pay freeze so we do have to do more to catch up and to start to get nearer to pay parity. We started that process last year when we increased the minimum attestation rate that centres have to sign up to in order to reach the highest rate of funding to at least the equivalent bottom step on the kindergarten teacher salary scale. So in order for a centre to access the highest per child per hour funding rate they have to attest that they are paying their staff at least the bottom step on the kindergarten teacher salary scale. That requirement came into force last year and we increased funding to accommodate that. Kindergarten teachers had a pay increase this year and so this year's Budget introduced extra funding to ensure that that parity did not go backwards. The Budget also set aside funding to apply from 1 January next year that will allow centres to go further. It will fund centres to allow their teachers to step their way up the salary scale up to step six of the kindergarten teacher salary scale depending on their length of service. So if they've been teaching there for three years they would get on to step three; for six years they would get on to step six. Over time it is the Government's intention to continue to increase funding and provide extra funding so that centres can make it all the way to the top of the kindergarten teacher salary scale and that is step 10.In order to be able to ensure that that extra funding actually flows through into teacher pay the Government wants to be able to establish a condition on access to the highest level of funding that relates to employment relations—i.e. that the centres sign up to saying that they will pay their staff at least those steps on the salary scale in order to get that extra level of funding. There is some ambiguity about whether the existing conditions that can be attached could do that so to remove all doubt about that we have put this extra provision in place. That will mean that we can attach that condition we can do that with certainty and those early childhood services will know that the condition is consistent with the Education and Training Act of 2020. So this minor amendment allows us to attach that condition.There is debate with the sector about whether or not the rates of funding being proposed are sufficient to meet the cost of moving all of those teachers to step six on the kindergarten teacher salary scale if they have done six years' worth of service. Those discussions are ongoing. We've had feedback from the sector about that. This bill does not relate specifically to the rates proposed. It simply allows the conditions to be put in place. The discussions around what the rates are when they should come into force and how that should be stepped out is a discussion that we continue to have with the sector. So the bill allows us to deliver pay parity but it is the work that we have to do once the bill is passed that is actually the important part which is to identify what the funding conditions are and to identify what the funding rates that go with those funding conditions are. I commend the bill to the House.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): The question is that the motion be agreed to.