Hipkins Chris: Annual Review Debate — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeHipkins Chris: Annual Review Debate — In Committee[Sitting date: 13 April 2016. Volume:713;Page:10513. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka): Thank you very much for the opportunity to take a call on this. I want to correct a few things that the Minister the Hon Louise Upston just mentioned. The first is that I think even a relatively cursory glance at the finances relating to tertiary education would show that on average on a per student basis the Government probably funds somewhere between 50 to 55 percent of the cost of a tertiary qualification and not the 70 percent that the Minister just mentioned.A relatively cursory glance at the statistics released by Universities New Zealand would also show that over the course of a graduate’s lifetime—or a trainee’s lifetime if it is someone doing an industry qualification—the amount of extra money that they would earn and the extra tax they would pay more than covers the cost of providing the subsidies for their education and more than covers the cost of meeting that additional component should the Government of the day choose to do so as the Labour Party is proposing. So what we find is that the higher the skill level of the population the higher the tax take we actually get. The Government ends up fiscally better off overall from having a more highly educated population because it collects more tax because they earn more money as a result. Actually the numbers simply stack up. Even Steven Joyce would acknowledge that because he is the one who is touting all of the figures to justify doing certain courses of study.But Universities New Zealand has gone so far as to calculate not just the post-qualification earnings but also the post-qualification tax take. And the post-qualification tax take of course goes up as well. It shows that actually an investment in tertiary education—whether it be a university degree a polytech programme or an on-the-job qualification—pays back to the Government more than it costs many many times over and even if we make it free. So it actually makes sense for the Government to be investing in that. This is a Government that claims it is taking an investment approach to social services but not when it comes to education apparently. I think the evidence there is pretty clear regarding the provision of free post-school education: that it stacks up. Of course if it did not then I am sure all those members on the opposite side who benefited from a free post-school education when they had the opportunity to get one would be clamouring to pay the money back.I want to turn instead to the issues around the school sector. I want to commend the people working in schools for the improvement in National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA) results. I think they definitely deserve a commendation for that. I do want to say that when it comes to NCEA it was a proposal floated by the then National Government in the 1990s adopted by the last Labour Government and continued with by the current National Government. I think NCEA is the right qualification system for New Zealand.I do however think that we need to be mindful as we push forward to encourage more and more students to gain NCEA qualifications that we are ensuring that they are on meaningful pathways that are going to lead them to something at the other end of it—because it is possible to increase the number of students getting NCEA qualifications but not necessarily getting better outcomes when they leave school. The analogy that one of the people who works in the education system used with me is that it is like going to the supermarket with an empty basket: you can fill up your basket with toothbrushes but you cannot then go home and bake a cake. If you look at NCEA being the same—if you fill your basket with a particular type of credit that is not necessarily going to give you all of the ingredients that you need to then go somewhere else once you have got it.So now that we have got the education system on a pathway to improving NCEA results which is a good thing we need to turn our attention to what is in that. What is actually in the basket? What are the skills and attributes that we are giving the kids when they leave school so that they are actually going on to do something meaningful whether that is employment or whether that is further education or training? That is where I think the next big challenge and the next big step for our focus on improving results must be because a qualification in itself—and we have had some good interchange on the 85 percent target for NCEA level 2—is not enough. This is the critical point. We could hit the target and get 100 percent of kids getting NCEA level 2 but if they are making up those qualifications with the wrong credits which are not then leading them on to another pathway are they actually better off? I am not convinced that they necessarily are.