Rich Katherine: General Debate 
Rich Katherine: General Debate 
[Volume:638;Page:8634] 
KATHERINE RICH (National) 
: 
 That member stands in the House and gloats about three out of every four families getting something out of Working for Families. He says that three out of four families now have to have a relationship with Work and Income in order to be able to survive and he thinks that that is a good thing. On the Opposition side of the House we think that more families should be independent. We do not want families to have an ongoing relationship with Work and Income. We do not think it is a good thing to inflict a case manager upon the nation’s people. He is talking about dependants. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: She doesn’t want families to have tax credits. Oh dear that’s shocking. 
KATHERINE RICH 
: “Stadium Boy” over there makes his comments but I would like to turn to a serious issue—the utterance of the Minister of Education Steve Maharey in this House. 
It is clear that the Minister Steve Maharey is under immense pressure when he resorts to using four-letter profanities in this House. That is deeply concerning and I know that some family members have phoned Television New Zealand (TVNZ) to complain already. One guy was sitting there today watching question time with his children. He was utterly disturbed to hear those kinds of things uttered on television. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: It’s not on TVNZ. What a foolish member. 
KATHERINE RICH 
: I should have said Sky but who cares these days? Steve Maharey has absolutely whittled down TVNZ to almost a mere shadow of its former self. Most people are watching question time off their Sky remote in any case. 
When the Minister of Education uses that kind of language what kind of standard does it represent from that side of the House? We do not tolerate that kind of language in our schools. Some students have been stood down or given detentions for using that kind of language and in some cases they have been kicked out of their schools. Here we have the Minister of Education using that kind of language in this House. It is the kind of language that makes some parents worry about their kids watching Parliament. What does it say about Parliament when some people worry about the kind of language they will hear? It is deeply concerning when someone who is usually so suave and articulate—and smarmy as John Tamihere would say—is caught out like that. 
The Minister is under huge pressure and we saw that today. But let us look at his track record as he has slithered from portfolio to portfolio. He still has the broadcasting portfolio. TVNZ used to be a company worth about a billion dollars. Who knows what it is worth now as it goes through its selection of redundancies? He used to be the Minister for Tertiary Education and under his watch the wananga went out of control. We saw a huge proliferation of courses like twilight golf homeopathy for pets and there was the “Singalong with Steve” radio show. That was also extremely popular. We saw a tidal wave of community courses that were of no value or little value to Kiwis. That took place under his watch. 
He is currently overseeing the fraudulent 20 hours’ free early childhood education policy. Before the last election the Ministers involved said that all 3 and 4-year-old children would get this service. Then the language kind of slithered again and they said that up to 92000 or they hoped up to 92000 or around 92000 kids would receive this service. However the figure will be in the tens of thousands and certainly not up to 92000 as only a small percentage of services have opted in. A tiny percentage of services in Auckland have opted in. It is just a disgrace. 
Then we have the continuing saga of the National Certificate of Educational Achievement. Steve Maharey has continued to say there are no problems with that but then after pressure from this side of the House he is suddenly looking at options for change. He is looking at recording failure on a Record of Learning. The Prime Minister told the country that she thought this had been done 2 years ago. What we saw in the House was the Minister failing to answer basic questions. If the Prime Minister thought this had happened why had he not done it? If it had been agreed to by Cabinet and by the Government why had he not put it in place? He had no answer to that. 
For all the weasel words that the Minister continues to use—and some of the super - weasel words we heard in the House today—it is very clear that Steve Maharey’s portfolio is in disarray. His answers to John Key’s ideas for policy were wet. He came out and argued for national testing and league tables when quite clearly we said they were not on the agenda. The Minister is in crisis. He is under pressure.