inflation increase and so they set prices and demand wages accordingly. the economy then ends up in a worse position with higher inflation and ( potentially ) higher unemployment ( see, for example, barro and gordon, 1983 ). ref # 7482042 v2. 2 government ”. 10 the rbnz act ( 1989 ) provided the bank with credibility in meeting its objective by no longer being subject to concerns or incentives regarding the electoral cycle. ( ii ) transparency ( rbnz act section 15 ) monetary policy operates with significant lags and in an inherently uncertain environment, and therefore naturally requires a great deal of judgement and discretion. to ensure that operational independence was used appropriately, the act also specified a high degree of transparency in how the bank formulated policy. the act requires the bank to publish regular statements on its monetary policy decisions and for these to be laid before parliament. the governor ’ s deliberations were also to be monitored and assessed by a board consisting of members appointed by the minister of finance. ( iii ) single objective ( rbnz act section 8 ) providing the bank with one objective, rather than a list of objectives – production, trade, full employment and price stability – as had been the case previously, made it more credible that the bank could actually achieve its mandate. the act states “ the primary function of the bank is to formulate and implement monetary policy directed to the economic objective of achieving and maintaining stability in the general level of prices. ” it acknowledged that price stability was the greatest contribution monetary policy could make to new zealand ’ s economic wellbeing. it recognised the limitations of monetary policy over the medium term, and provided the bank, financial markets and wider public with a clear objective for policy. moreover, the initial pta clearly defined price stability with a numerical target band of 0 to 2 percent. this clear numerical target provided a nominal anchor against which the governor ’ s performance could be assessed and around which inflation expectations could converge. ( iv ) single decision maker ( rbnz act section 9 ) the final stake in the ground was the assignment of authority and responsibility to an individual – the governor. this ‘ single decision - maker ’ model was highly influenced by the principles underpinning the reform of the wider public sector at the time, which gave individual public sector managers the authority to manage but made them directly accountable for outputs ( reddell, 1999 and sherwin, 1999 ). the employment contract between the minister of finance and the governor evolved into the pta. the legislation

cycle and many indicators of success or signs of failure. we need to be broadening our definition of success to extend beyond just university degrees as an indicator and enabler of skills. of the experts who have made this point are mary metcalfe, mark orkin and jennie glennie. in a newspaper article earlier this year, succinctly titled “ our pass rate focus is too narrow ”, they outlined three critical additional indicators of success for education. the first is retention. in other words, are learners staying in school for a reasonable amount of time? this is not to say that all learners must, or will, finish 12 years of schooling. while this is unquestionably the ideal, the reality will always fall short. but how far does the reality fall short and for how many learners? any situation where significant numbers of learners are leaving the schools system at a point before which they have a fundamental and critical mass of skill, cannot consider itself successful. the second is quality. again, this is a self - evident and common sense indicator ; one that speaks of meaningful teaching and learning and reasonable proportions of good and excellent marks within a framework of high standards. access to education is of minimal benefit if the quality of that education is at best only marginally better than no education at all. the third additional indicator of success, over and above matric pass rates, is equity. when education provides social mobility across issues such as gender, race, income and / or geography, it can be judged to be successful. when a lack of equity entrenches, rather than transcends, social patterns, the opposite is clearly true. within this cycle of interdependence, and the debates around what successful education really looks like, quality maths skills are critical – both as ends in and of themselves as well as means to various ends. in the same article i referred to earlier, mary metcalfe and her coauthors called maths results “ the litmus test of system quality for the needs of a modern economy. ” and once again, the results of our litmus test are deeply troubling. while it is true that south africa ’ s maths pass rates have remained unchanged over the past few years, given that the number of candidates writing matric maths has declined, i. e. the denominator has decreased, basic maths tells us that the numerator must have decreased too for this ratio to have remained constant.