Carter Chris: Employment Relations Amendment Bill — Second Reading In Committee 
Carter Chris: Employment Relations Amendment Bill — Second Reading In Committee 
[Volume:651;Page:437] 
Hon CHRIS CARTER (Labour—Te Atatu) 
: 
 I rise again to reinforce to the Minister in the chair the Hon Kate Wilkinson that Mr Mallard’s exemption is on the Table at the moment. It seeks an exemption for teachers from the 90-day clause and this is really important. 
As I said earlier some 30 percent of our schools have 20 employees or fewer. When Labour came into Government in 1999 60 percent of our schools had 20 employees of fewer but thanks to our wonderful staffing endowment of 1:18 then 1:15 and extra staff for learning support we have seen the number of small schools drop. Nevertheless 30 percent of our schools—about 800 schools—have 20 employees or fewer. Finding staff for these schools has been a very difficult issue which the National Party has often raised in question time: how difficult it is to find quality teachers for rural remote and small urban schools. But how will this legislation impact on that? It will impact in a very negative way. 
In addition to these 800 or so small schools we have about 5000 early childhood education centres or ECEs. These have also expanded enormously with our 20 free hours’ policy and with over a billion dollars in investment in new capacity in early childhood learning. As every member here knows and supports getting children into early childhood education is the best and most effective thing we can do to set them on a successful learning path. It avoids all of those other issues we are so exercised about such as crime underachievement unemployment and so on. What happens to these early childhood education centres? At the moment there is a chronic shortage of staff. Yes we have invested in capacity. Yes we have invested in salaries. We are rapidly trying to train young people to go into the early childhood education sector. 
But what sort of message will this legislation send out to those young potential teachers wanting to go in? They are being told that sure they will have to do their 3 years’ training and be assessed professionally but if the principal or the board of trustees do not like them and if in some way they do not fit in then they are out. When Mr Mallard spoke earlier he talked about how often in isolated communities issues that might not exercise us very much become very divisive. Often a board of trustees is dominated by one family or one group. I have had to deal over my desk as Minister of Education with some very unpleasant and unhappy situations in schools where we have had to put in statutory intervention. If there was an extra capacity for a board of trustees or a principal to sack teachers for no reason whatsoever—remember under this legislation it is not required to give a reason—then that sort of abuse could easily happen. 
This legislation will be a barrier to recruiting staff particularly principals and as we all know the principal is the key to a successful school. It is getting harder to attract principals into rural areas and small failing schools. Every member here can probably think of his or her own electorate where there is a school that is perceived by the community as not being successful. The way of turning those schools around is to get the best type of principal possible but this legislation gives a board of trustees the ability to sack a principal. 
Earlier we heard the rationale from National speakers that this was a new opportunity to get people into employment and that employers would take new migrants and young people who are currently unemployed. I have to say to the Minister that the process of a person becoming a teacher is a rigorous process. There is a training period. There is a 2-year probationary period. Teachers are required—and Mrs Tolley probably does not know this—to have a yearly assessment against professional standards. There is a standard for beginning teachers a different standard for fully registered teachers and another one for experienced teachers. There are lots of mechanisms in place to make sure that the teachers in our schools are professional competent and doing their jobs and if they are not there are mechanisms to remove them.  
I was a teacher for many years. I was privileged to be the Minister of Education and my partner is a school principal so this is a sector I know very well. I say to the Minister that I cannot see how this legislation will positively impact on employment in schools.