Davis Kelvin: Budget Debate 
Davis Kelvin: Budget Debate 
[Volume:654;Page:4185] 
KELVIN DAVIS (Labour) 
: 
 I wish to talk about the effects the Budget will have on the education and tourism portfolios both of which I am a spokesperson for. As we all realise education is the pathway to success. Success or lack thereof in the education system is a very good predictor of success in life and in particular in an individual’s search for meaningful employment. This Budget should have been about jobs. It is my observation that the Budget delivered last week will do little to create meaningful employment in the short term mid term or long term. Investment in education is a long-term investment in the future workforce. 
When I look at the bottom line in the Vote Education section of the Estimates of Appropriations I see that education spending has risen from $11.2 billion to $11.5 billion. That is an increase of over $300 million so I congratulate the Minister of Education Anne Tolley on securing that extra investment in our children. However taking a closer analysis of where the money is going I believe that the Minister continues to miss the point in terms of what is important in education. She has put money into areas that are not the most effective or efficient in raising student achievement. I come from the position that the main purpose of the education system is to make students learn. Raising student achievement is the core business of schools and schooling therefore funding needs to be directed to the areas of education that will make students learn as fast as possible. Almost every strategy makes students learn to some degree or another therefore there is probably nothing in this Budget that will not make students learn. The question I ask the Minister of Education is whether she is convinced that the funding priorities in this Budget will make New Zealand school students learn to as high a level as possible as quickly as possible. 
The first things I looked for in the Vote Education appropriation were in the areas of teacher support professional development and community engagement. In the areas of support and resourcing for teachers—of expenditure on policies focused on supporting the work and capability of teachers—there was a $5 million cut. Instead of cutting the budget for supporting and improving teacher capability we should increase it significantly. It is the ability of the teacher that determines how fast and how far students can learn. Until we in this Parliament really truly understand that excellent teachers make a difference to student achievement and until we invest in teachers instead of slashing support for them we will struggle to improve the long tail of underachievement in New Zealand schools. I acknowledge the $7 million in funding that the Government has set aside for interventions with target student groups. I congratulate it on this allocation but it is simply not enough. A good idea under-resourced is a bad idea. I know for certain that in the Northland area alone $7 million would be consumed in just a matter of months in dealing with students with special needs who require alternative education options or who have participation issues. 
I looked in the section of the Budget entitled “Support and Resources for the Community”. This section deals with policies and programmes focused on the community’s knowledge of and participation in the education system. Community engagement in the education system is vital. Research shows that parents who engage with schools and understand the language of the education system are better able to advocate for their children. Instead of a $400000 cut to that budget we need a substantial increase so that we can support Maori communities in particular to engage with their schools as equal partners. We all know that the tail of underachievers is made up mainly of Maori kids whom the system is failing so why has funding not been increased to allow Maori communities to engage with their schools? As long as Maori parents see barriers to engaging with their children’s schools on what really counts—talking about achievement teaching strategies and the “What next?” steps in a child’s learning path—the tail of underachievement will persist. Unfortunately too many schools believe that parental involvement means having parents come on school camps and drive kids to sports day. We need to change that misconception. 
The section in the Budget entitled “Curriculum Support” deals with the purchase of supplementary educational programmes for schools and communities in order to ensure wider access to opportunities. That budget has been slashed from $70 million to $65.5 million. Teachers need curriculum support; they do not need that funding to be slashed. It was with despair that I read about the cuts to professional development. Professional development is exactly the area that resources should be going into not coming out of. As I said earlier this Budget should have been about job creation. With the slashes to Vote Education it is difficult to see that the education system is being supported to equip all New Zealand students to achieve successfully and to enable them to move from school into meaningful employment in years to come. 
I am also the spokesperson for tourism. Tourism is New Zealand’s biggest export earner. One in ten New Zealanders derives an income from the tourism industry. It deserves greater support and funding. Tourism is vital to our economy. In order for the tourism industry to thrive the Minister of Tourism John Key needed to put on his thinking cap and figure out a way to get more people into New Zealand then to get them to spend more time here and to part with more money. For every $1 we spend on promoting ourselves in Australia we get $26 back. In the UK we get back $11 for every $1 we spend on promotion and in the United States we get back $16. The obvious solution is to increase and improve international awareness of New Zealand and of what we have to offer by way of our people landscapes activities and culture. We have to pique the interest of potential tourists to New Zealand and then convert that interest into actual visits. 
Instead what did we get? A $50 million spend-up on what can only be described as a brain implosion but what National likes to call a cycleway. Do not get me wrong—I am a keen cyclist and see potential of sorts in a cycleway. But at a time when we are told that money is scarce the Prime Minister has still managed to find a lazy $50 million to pour into his pet project. Instead we should look to invest in the areas of tourism where we can get the best bang for our buck. With all due respect to the Prime Minister and to the minute he took to develop the idea I think this is less of a bang and more like a clanger. But he had to front it to save face. This was not a decision made in the best interests of New Zealand or tourism. It was about saving the Prime Minister from political embarrassment. It was interesting to watch members opposite contort themselves as they justified the boss’s baby when we all know that they all know that we all know that it is nothing more than a prime ministerial - sized folly. 
I cannot see a cycleway being built for $50 million. A substantial amount of that $50 million will need to be put into construction; another substantial part into maintenance; another substantial part into promotion both domestically and internationally; and another substantial part into developing the Internet and information technology capacity that will go alongside the cycleway because the types of tourists likely to use the cycleway will be the little wealthier and more discerning travellers who will want to keep in touch with friends and family and maybe even do business along the way. There would be no better way to promote our beautiful country than by having an international tourist sitting beside a lake with bush-clad hills and snow-covered mountains in the distance make a video call on his or her laptop to friends family or clients back home. It would be free advertising. We are in danger of building a $50 million white elephant that no one knows about internationally and with Air New Zealand’s recent cuts to a number of international routes very few people will be able to get to it in any case. The tourism industry has been short-changed not just by the $5 million cut to its total annual and permanent appropriations but also by the short-sighted and poorly conceived concept of a cycleway. The industry deserves better.