9. Question No. 9—EducationHon NIKKI KAYE (National—Auckland Central) to the Minister of EducationQuestion No. 9—Education9. Hon NIKKI KAYE (National—Auckland Central) to the Minister of Education: Is he confident that the Government is taking all necessary measures in our education system to reduce the impact of COVID-19 and keep people safe?Hon CHRIS HIPKINS (Minister of Education): Yes. As I've said to the member and said publicly it is a rapidly evolving situation and advice is being updated and is changing. Health officials and education officials are working very closely together to keep people safe. They have agreed a joint protocol which they're implementing which takes into account a whole variety of different scenarios and situations. The approach is currently a targeted one because there is no community transmission at this point. We saw this in effect yesterday where public health authorities closed a school temporarily where there was confirmation of a case. Public health advice is that schools and early childhood services are safe places for young people to be. The health safety and wellbeing of New Zealanders is of upmost importance and as situations change we will take action accordingly.Hon Nikki Kaye: What criteria does the Government have for full or regional closure of schools or other education providers due to COVID-19?Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: The protocols that are being implemented at the moment have a number of different escalation points. At the moment we're still at the lower level of that so we're still looking at cases where children have gone to school where their parents may have been tested positive but they have not displayed any symptoms or where a student has gone to school who has been displaying symptoms and in that case it would be the school that is closed. For where there was a series of unrelated cases within a community of course the number of school closures would depend on the particular circumstances. Where there was evidence of community transmission within a particular geographical area then closure of schools within that geographical area may be deemed by those officials to be appropriate and where there was widespread community transmission throughout the country then those are the circumstances under which a more widespread school closure would be considered.Hon Nikki Kaye: Has he considered bringing forward the school holidays as a pre-emptive public health measure to fight COVID-19?Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: Yes we are receiving advice on those sorts of things all of the time. Bringing forward the school holidays early in order to create some breathing space is an option and if the public health advice is that that's useful that's certainly on the table as one of the options that they can draw on.Hon Nikki Kaye: What arrangements can he confirm for the capacity for large-scale remote learning either via online learning or broadcasting as a result of COVID-19?Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: The officials at the Ministry of Education along with representatives of the telecommunications industry have been working on a whole variety of different scenarios. There's a series of issues to be worked through: one is obviously the learning materials and the teaching that goes with those but then there's also the capacity. With regards to capacity that's going to depend on the circumstances; it's also going to depend on how many other people may be using the network—people working from home and so on. So there's a whole variety of different scenarios being mapped out and I do want to thank the telecommunications industry for their cooperation here—they've been working very constructively with the Government. With regard to remote teaching we've obviously got some additional capacity through Te Kura at the moment where there are isolated cases—for example where there might be one or two schools that are closed for a period of time or where students are in self-isolation. Online resources are currently being made available for students who are in self-isolation so they can continue their learning for that period of time. When we get to the point where we are—if we end up—looking at much larger closure then that's obviously a much bigger thing to plan for. Scenario planning is taking place for that should that eventuate.Hon Nikki Kaye: When is he expecting to announce a further financial support package for education providers to ensure they can deal with the impact of COVID-19?Hon CHRIS HIPKINS: There are a number of different variables here. When it comes to schools schools are relatively well-prepared financially because their funding is very certain—we fund them based on the number of students that they have and we have a great degree of control over that funding and will keep that money flowing. In early childhood education I am looking at some of the regulatory settings around funding for early childhood education—for example where there are a significant number of increased absences how the funding system may change if that eventuates because I know particularly for small early childhood centres that's a very real consideration. And also at the tertiary end of the system where there are also sort of funding penalties for a variety of different things we're looking at those as well to make sure that we are easing pressure where we can where the situation genuinely is beyond an education provider's control. For private training establishments for those services where they've experienced a significant decline in their business—particularly those dealing with large numbers of international students—there is already support available through the package the Minister of Finance announced earlier in the week. We've got some very open dialogue with those parts of the sector as well to see what more we can do to ease some of that pressure.