Turei Metiria: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
Turei Metiria: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
[Volume:628;Page:264] 
11.  
METIRIA TUREI (Green) 
 to the  
Minister for Trade Negotiations 
: What steps has he taken to ensure that the Friends of Private Education Exports to be established by New Zealand will not result in public funding of overseas-owned tertiary providers and undermine the Government’s ability to ensure high quality? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN (Deputy Prime Minister) 
 on behalf of the 
 Minister for Trade Negotiations 
: The group was set up to protect and advance the interests of New Zealand’s private education exporters in the World Trade Organization (WTO) General Agreement on Trade in Services negotiations. The group was explicitly set up to pursue improved export opportunities in private not public education. Of course those providers that already meet New Zealand regulatory standards in the private sector can be overseas owned. That is the current situation. 
Metiria Turei 
: Can the Minister guarantee that New Zealand public universities and polytechs will not be forced to compete for public funding with overseas-owned tertiary providers given the New Zealand Educational Institute’s concern that virtually all education has some element of private funding in it and given Association of University Staff president Nigel Haworth’s concerns that officials have not yet set a definition of private education within the WTO rules? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: Taking the first part of the question no the Minister cannot because he is the Minister for Trade Negotiations. But the Minister for Tertiary Education can. 
Hon Bill English 
: Is the Minister aware that in respect of our own export education industry the Rt Hon Winston Peters has stated this week that the Government has not done enough to help foreign students in New Zealand but that the Hon Phil Goff has contradicted those statements; can he tell us which of those Ministers represents Government policy on this matter? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: Clearly Mr Peters does not have portfolio responsibility for New Zealand’s export education industry. Mr Goff is the Minister of Trade and reflects the Government’s position. 
Hon Brian Donnelly 
: Can the Minister explain why this Government is starting such a group as mentioned in the primary question to promote private sector education when back at home its own agency the Tertiary Education Commission is killing off our private training establishment sector through a “death by a thousand bureaucratic cuts” process? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: No I cannot because that question is not properly addressed to the Minister for Trade Negotiations. 
Metiria Turei 
: Why is this Government pushing for further free-trade agreements in education when there is a real risk that New Zealand will lose the right to limit the number of universities the number of overseas students and the number of English language schools or lose the right to require that educational facilities be not for profit or have staff and student representation on their boards? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: The Government has as I said guiding principles for preparing our initial service offer. The sixth of those states: “The Government will make no initial offer that would limit the Government’s right to provide fund or regulate public services such as health and education.” One can jump at shadows on the wall in that respect but they are puppet shadows not real ones. 
Metiria Turei 
: Has it not occurred to the Government that its single-minded pursuit of private education exports risks a repeat of the recent fiascos in tertiary education like the twilight golf courses and the wasteful proliferation of low-quality sub-degree courses; and did that crisis not clearly demonstrate the need to protect to the utmost domestic control and regulation of the tertiary sector? 
Hon Dr MICHAEL CULLEN 
: As I just said these negotiations will not affect our ability to regulate the educational area and I am sure that the Minister for Tertiary Education takes a very dim view of some of those sorts of courses.