Appropriation (2026/27 Estimates) Bill

Thank you, Madam Speaker. On behalf of the Education and Workforce Committee chair, Katie Nimon, I want to thank the committee for the work that they put into the Estimates on education. I also want to thank the Minister for the ongoing investment in education as detailed in the Estimates report—in particular, the school property component as detailed on page 12. As the MP for Whanganui, I want to use an example of that being the condition upgrade at Te Paepae o Aotea. I note that this property investment has extended to the recent announcement, as well, of the 500 schools turning solar into savings across the country and, on page 13, the investment into specialist schools, noting the new specialist school in Gisborne—the first in 50 years.

The investment in Vote Education in Budget 2026 also funds property projects like walls going up in classrooms across the country, enabling classrooms to calm down. In addition, I want to highlight the investment in industry-led subjects, as detailed on page 13, aimed at bringing industry and classrooms closer together.

Finally, learning support continues to receive focus and investment, as detailed on page 7, including an $844 million allocation for the three main learning support services. It would be appreciated if the Minister could further detail how Vote Education will continue to fix the basics and build the future.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I’d like to know, from the Minister, about the cost of the Student Monitoring, Reporting and Assessment Tool (SMART) from the Budget. I’d like to know: what has been the total cost to date of developing and rolling out the SMART tool, and also how much is forecast to be spent on the SMART tool over the remaining forecast period?

Following on from that question—we just got the post-hearing questions back as well—in the summary of initiatives on page, I believe, 27, the Student Monitoring, Reporting and Assessment Tool (SMART) programme is supposed to be extended to year 11, which we’d heard, in the select committee, is going to go to the New Zealand Qualifications Authority instead. We are still puzzled, despite the post-hearing questions, at why, between the approval and the printing of the summary of initiatives to the select committee hearing, there has been a change of the use of SMART for year 11 students.

In addition to understanding what the cost is of the Student Monitoring, Reporting and Assessment Tool (SMART), I’ve also got some questions in and around the intention of its use. In the initial papers that we got from Treasury, in the assessment, it’s very clear that there is language that shows that the Government intends to use this as a single tool for assessment—a “light touch”, all the language the Minister uses. But there’s been quite a change recently to say, in more recent documents, that there’ll always be a second tool, which is the Progressive Achievement Tests (PAT) there. I’d really like to understand, from the Minister, why there’s been a shift in language from documents that were issued earlier in the term, from when she took office to now, as to whether or not the SMART tool will be the only tool and, if it is not the only tool and if she is still intending to have PAT, which she has said, why did she spend approximately $170-odd million on the SMART tool? A lot of the rationale in the business case is that that’s the only tool.

I’m interested in the cost of the SMART tool, whether she can confirm it’s going to be, why the investment was justified if it’s not the only tool, and then confirm why she’s provided additional funding for the PAT testing run by the New Zealand Council for Educational Research. Why is that second lot of testing getting additional funding if the SMART tool has already had a substantial amount of funding?

Also, I’d be really interested to understand why she thinks there’s been an increase in schools using the PAT tests when they have to pay for them and when the SMART tool is available for free. That project cost—I’m guessing; I’ll wait to hear—approximately $170 million. There’s now another tool that’s being funded by the Government for approximately $300,000, and the schools are using the one that’s not the one that we’ve spent, as taxpayers, $170 million on. Why is there low use of the tool, given the fact there’s been substantial Government investment?

The reason that we have invested—and I’ll come back to the member with the exact figures, because we want to get them exactly right, and we don’t have them right to hand at the moment around the exact amount invested into the Student Monitoring, Assessment and Reporting Tool (SMART), but we will come back with that.

The reason that we’ve done that is that we are one of the only countries we compare ourselves to that doesn’t have a Government-backed and paid for tool. The one that we do have currently is completely out of date; it is no longer useable—we’ve made that really clear. It has to be replaced, and we’ve chosen to do that with the new SMART tool. It is a freely available tool for schools to use. We’ve had incredible uptake—over 300,000 that were registered into it—more than we had expected in the first year.

It is important for us to be able to have choice in the system with a freely available tool, and if schools choose to use the Progressive Achievement Tests (PAT) and pay for that, like many of them have been doing for a long time, then that is a choice that they can make. But it was always very important to us to have a freely available tool. What we have noticed is that many schools are using both. They’ve continued to use PAT, and they’re using SMART as a trial as well—noting that it is going to take us until next year until we have that SMART tool completely fully computer adaptive while we’re building up the number of questions that sit in the data bank.

It is important to us to have a freely available tool, and I can confirm that there will continue to be choice in the system. Many schools like using PAT, and I’ve made it very clear that we want to continue having that choice. I don’t want schools to have to pay for something if they don’t have the money in their budget, and we are creating a tool that is a world-leading tool; it does all the things we need it to do, and we’ll continue to refine it as we get really good feedback from the sector.

Can the Minister explain, then, why, in the initial business case and the reports issued by Treasury, the wording indicates that the justification for such a significant investment—whenever we find that figure—is on the basis that this is a movement towards the use of a single tool? Those words are used in the documents to justify such a significant investment. I’m really interested to understand from the Minister what has caused a change in direction, from her and her Government, away from the use of one single tool to now saying that not only are there two tools, but the Government is funding that second tool to the tune of approximately $300,000. I’m interested to understand that.

I’m also interested to understand, we know that there’s been a number of issues with the Student Monitoring, Assessment and Reporting Tool—whether it’s the artificial intelligence function, whether it’s been the data breach. I’m interested to understand from the Minister, is there a formal or a complaints system where schools are able to register their concerns when things aren’t working as they should be?

We have already sent out our team to do meetings and webinars all across the country. The programme director has been busying racking up his air miles, because he has been out talking to schools—from small, rural, and isolated schools from the bottom of the South Island to the top of the North Island—to get feedback. We’ve already gone back to schools and said, “Hello, thank you very much for your feedback. You’ve told us this, and now here are the changes we’re making.”

I think you can reasonably expect that with any big, new technology tool, there will be improvements to be made. There was nothing in this that caused us concern other than small tweaks along the way that we were able to fix up, as in any big project. It’s the same with e-asTTle when it was very first launched as well; it went through a number of iterations after getting really good feedback from the sector. I’m looking forward to the tool next year, when it will be fully computer adaptive, and it will be one of the best tools available in the world.

Madam Chair, thank you very much. I have an Official Information Act (OIA) request, actually, which is asking the Ministry of Education for how many complaints or concerns regarding the Student Monitoring, Assessment and Reporting Tool (SMART). The response to that OIA is that there is no formal system for that to happen. They say, in this response, we know that the Ministry has not formally tracked complaints, “and we further noted that sector inquiries have been received through many different communication channels”. They’ve got lots through lots of channels, but there’s no formal tracked complaints process for the SMART tool.

I’m just wondering—and I can give you the number of the report if she wishes; it’s GEMS-49441—does she think it’s acceptable to New Zealanders that for an investment of approximately $170 million that has had some significant concerns with data breaches and concerns with how many schools are actually using it, there is actually no formal complaints process available for those schools to lodge their concerns?

No. Look, I’m not concerned because, as already said, we have a process where we’ve been going out to schools and reaching out. We also have a number of ways that schools can reach out to us, like they do with all of the issues and concerns that they have. They’ve got leadership advisers; they’ve got many staff in the regions all around New Zealand in order to raise their concerns with us.

I wouldn’t characterise some of the things the member has mentioned as being significant. There are some things that we can change and upgrade, as we did with e-asTTle—it was exactly the same—and we are doing those things. We’ve already gone back out to the sector and said, “Here are the changes we’re going to make”. In fact, I was at a school, and I was asking some of the children, what were some of the things that they wanted to see, and they gave me some great feedback as well.

There is a range of different ways that schools can get in touch with us—and they are—but the great thing is that we are responding to them. We are making changes to make sure that the tool is one that is fit for purpose and that is going to get us, for the first time in our country’s history, really good data all the way through from year 3 to 8—which we’ve not had before—so the Government knows whether or not we need to invest more in certain areas, and where to direct our investment and resource; so that teachers know what the next steps for learning are and can moderate their teacher judgments in the reports to parents; and also, importantly, so that parents can know by strand how their children are doing and how they can help at home, which is exactly why we’ve built the parent portal tool, so that parents can log in and use some of those resources to help the learning at home.

Does the Minister have any intention to introduce a formal way of recording concerns or complaints? I appreciate she’s made the point that there are various different mechanisms for a parent or a school to make a formal complaint around data being used or the way the system isn’t working. But does she not think that it’s inappropriate for an investment of $170 million to say “We don’t know how many complaints we’re getting, and we have no formal mechanism for recording those complaints”—no risk register, no understanding of where they’re recorded? I don’t know if that’s fiscally responsible for such a significant investment in children’s data and when there’s already been a breach, that you have simply no system for recording and holding and responding to complaints.

Furthermore, I’d like to know from the Minister whether New Zealanders have a right, a transparency right, to understand the number of complaints that have been received about the Student Monitoring, Assessment and Reporting Tool.

Well, I’ve been advised that there is a risk register, and I will follow that up with the Ministry of Education.

I find it really rich from that member to talk about accountability for spending, because when I became the Minister of Education, I went through a Budget process—the very first Budget process—where I said to the Secretary of Education, “Can you please tell me, what are all the things you spend money on?” and they went away, and they dutifully came back with a list of things. Then I said to them, “Well, what do these things do?” and they dutifully went away and came back, and they described what those things do. Then I asked the killer question: “What are the outcomes for all of these things that we spend money on?” Do you know what the Secretary for Education said to me? “Minister, we don’t know”. For the previous six years, nobody from the previous Government had asked them, “What are the actual outcomes for the money that we are spending?” “We just get new money and we spend it.”—because that’s how the previous Government operated. We are bringing a level of transparency and accountability and outcomes for the money that we spend, so it’s very rich for that member to get up and say, “Oh, well, it’s very important to account for the spending.” Well, you know what happened in the last six years in Government, because we spent $20 billion in education and things went backwards under her watch.

I’m still waiting to hear whether it is $170 million—we haven’t heard that yet. We would like to know, if she’s really big on transparency: how much has this Government spent to date on the Student Monitoring, Assessment and Reporting Tool (SMART)? How much is it projected forward? I have documents showing it’s approximately $178 million. I’d like her to confirm how much has been spent to date and how much is yet to be spent to date. She can also tell us what the length of the contract is with Janison, if that would be helpful, but I’m also interested to understand why she has provided additional funding to progressive achievement tests (PAT) and changed the messaging to say there’ll be two when the very reason underpinning the significant investment in the business case outside of the usual Budget cycle was because we wanted a single tool, and this was the reason we had to. Why $170 million when there’s investment into something going on? It indicates that there’s something wrong with the SMART tool. If we’ve spent that much on it and we’re still investing in a backup system somewhere else, what’s happening for the fact that schools are picking up PATs faster than they are the tool that we’ve all paid $170 million for? Wouldn’t you think it would be nice to have a copy of the risk register—now I understand that exists—and shouldn’t there be transparency around the teething problems that’ve caused children’s data to be leaked?

CHAIRPERSON (Maureen Pugh): Can I just remind the member that the Minister of Education addressed the question of the cost and said that when the figures come through, she will let the House know.

Point of order. Madam Chair, thank you so much. I didn’t want to interrupt the flow of the questions around the Student Monitoring, Assessment and Reporting Tool. I want to just seek clarity from you, Chair, before I go on. The Minister in the seat, the Hon Erica Stanford, is not the Minister who usually oversees areas like early childhood education and charter schools. Can I just check I’m able to still ask questions to that Minister, noting that officials are here and able to provide support? I just want to check that clarification first. Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON (Maureen Pugh): My understanding is that that’s fine.

Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan: Great, thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Is the rate of use for the Student Monitoring, Assessment and Reporting Tool (SMART) as expected, higher than expected, or lower than expected? So that one, just to recap: is the rate of use for the SMART tool as expected, higher than expected, or lower than expected—multi-choice. There have been some reports that some schools won’t use the SMART tool at all. What work has been done to understand why that is, and is that the case? Have any teachers or schools reported that the SMART tool doesn’t meet their needs, and, if so, why is that the case?

There was also, as we’ve already discussed and raised, a highly publicised incident regarding the SMART tool data and data leak. It has since been revealed that the SMART tool was only certified three days before being rolled out, and the ministry raised concerns and Treasury raised concerns. Interested to know: was the Minister of Education pressured to roll out the SMART tool before it was actually ready? Were the Government security checks ahead of the roll-out adequate, and, if so, did this breach occur if they were? The privacy impact assessment seems to indicate that there was still work to be done there. Is the Minister confident in all of that work in relation to the certification for privacy being in place early enough for those protections to be in place? I’d be also interested to understand how much was spent on cleaning up the data breach, and what assurances she can now give that it won’t occur again.

Finally, also interested to know: how many complaints have schools or teachers made about the SMART tool, and is that information collated in the risk register or is it not?

Feels like some of those questions have been asked and answered already, which is good—that cuts down the time we have, to answer this one at least. We always wanted choice in the system. There were lots of discussions very early on about being able to keep e-asTTle up and running—turns out in the end we’re not able to do it, because the technology was just too old. We have invested in the New Zealand Council for Educational Research. We’ve given them some money to upgrade one of their assessments, because we want choice in the system, and it’s up to schools which ones they choose; I’m not going to predetermine or tell schools which tool they have to use.

We didn’t have an expected rate of people picking up the Student Monitoring, Assessment and Reporting Tool (SMART) this year. We have three tools available this year, including the freely available e-asTTle tool as well. We expect over time that as we make improvements, especially next year when it becomes completely, fully computer adaptive, we will have more pick-up. I do know that schools are hedging their bets at the moment. Some of them are continuing to use progressive achievement tests (PAT) and are considering SMART, because it is free, and some schools are using both. But I would expect that all tools have had an uptick given that not all schools were using an assessment tool: not all schools were using PAT, not all were using e-asTTle, and certainly nobody was using SMART because it didn’t exist. But we have mandated, for good reason, twice-yearly assessments so we can track data, as has been brought up and requested by the Education Review Office for about 10 years. It is important that we have that data.

So, yes, we expected that there would be an uptick across all three tools, and there was. We didn’t have any particular expectations around SMART, but when we did see that 300,000 users had been registered, that was something that was really exciting for us. We’ve already discussed about the fact that there is a register, and I am confident and the ministry were confident that the SMART tool was ready to roll out.

In terms of the small data breach that occurred, we’ve already been through that process. It wasn’t, of course, ideal, and we’ve gone through those schools that were affected. It was a very small issue, it was solved almost immediately, and that particular issue can’t happen again.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I’m just wondering, seeing that the Minister of Education has her Secretary for Education and deputy secretary: between the three of them, do you think she’ll be able to tell us how much the Government has spent on the Student Monitoring, Assessment and Reporting Tool (SMART) to date and how much is projected forward? I think between the three women there, they could clearly provide that information today—not in a week. I’m sure that information is available, and people would like to know that.

My next question is: why has there been an increase of schools doing progressive achievement testing (PAT) when the SMART tool has been available?

So two main questions: what’s the number, and why has there been an uptick in PAT when the SMART tool is available for free?

CHAIRPERSON (Maureen Pugh): Look, before I give the Minister of Education the call, can I just remind the member that repetition is a problem. These questions have been asked many times already. The numbers are still being worked on. I’ve just checked with the Minister: the numbers are being worked on in the back office; they’ll be here as soon as they can collate them. But in terms of asking the same questions, I think it’s time we moved on to a new topic. Lawrence Xu-Nan.

Sorry—point of order, Madam Speaker. The Minister of Education was just about to stand up and answer what I asked, which was: I want to know how much money’s been spent on the Student Monitoring, Assessment and Reporting Tool. This is the Estimates; we’re looking at the Budget. That’s a fair question—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Maureen Pugh): Yes, it is.

Hon GINNY ANDERSEN: —and she was just going to answer but you interrupted. So I’d really like her to answer that question.

What I was going to say was that my officials behind me are working on getting the exact dollar amount as we speak, as has already been mentioned to that member. I was going to answer her question—again, the same question she asked already—about why there were upticks in usage of progressive achievement testing. It was exactly as we expected: there were upticks in usage of every tool, because we made it mandatory. Every school had to use it; every child had to use it. The great news is that, now, parents got mid-year reports that were so much more detailed, in many cases, within the strands of mathematics, for example, so that they knew exactly how their children were progressing and what they could do at home. It responded to the Education Review Office report, which said for the best part of 10 years that it’s really important we have consistent tools, or a tool, to make sure that we are measuring this. The Auditor-General said the same thing.

Thank you. Just signalling to the Minister and also the officials, I’m going to ask some questions around the curriculum and I’m going to move on to learning support after that. Around the curriculum, I want to start with the science curriculum for year 0 to 10, which has just been announced. Now, the Minister has mentioned before in oral questions that climate change is going to be added in, but climate change or climate is in the curriculum. I did have a look at the science curriculum. The word “climate” is not in the year 0 to 10 curriculum at all. It’s mentioned sporadically and is to do with, essentially, the weather system but not when it comes to human-made climate changes or climate changes being exacerbated by human activities. Can I just check with the Minister that that whole complexity around exacerbation of climate change by human-made activities will be in the year 0 to 10 science curriculum?

And just also on the science curriculum, can the Minister please elucidate for the committee who is Theophrastus, and why should five-year-olds know who he is in the draft year 0 to 10 curriculum?

I could continue on and talk about the social science curriculum.

CHAIRPERSON (Maureen Pugh): You want another call?

Dr LAWRENCE XU-NAN: Yep.

CHAIRPERSON (Maureen Pugh): Lawrence Xu-Nan.

Dr LAWRENCE XU-NAN: Thank you. When we’re looking at the social science curriculum, could the Minister help the committee understand why Te Tiriti o Waitangi isn’t taught until year 7 and 8? Other things are taught, but why is Te Tiriti o Waitangi specifically not taught until year 8 of the junior social sciences curriculum, while Pompeii is taught in year 2 and Egypt is taught in year 4?

With that, will the Minister please elucidate for the committee on what does AD stand for and what is the difference between hieroglyphs and hieroglyphics?

I’d be interested to understand from the Minister if she’s budgeted for the increased teachers needed to implement year-by-year curriculum. As she’s no doubt aware, there are many classrooms around New Zealand that have more than one year in one classroom. This presents a clear problem for teachers if they’re having to deliver a year-by-year curriculum. So where is the allocation in the Budget that provides for additional teachers to implement her year-by-year curriculum and when will this be available?

My next question is in relation to that. Does she have a plan to increase staffing to all schools that have composite classes so that they are able to implement her year-by-year curriculum? Or is she going to build some more walls? No. Or is she going to redesign the curriculum to cater for year 1 to year 3 schools where single year groups are not possible? So recap: is there a budget for increased teachers and does she have a plan to increase staffing to all schools that have composite classes?

My next question is: does she know what proportion of the spend on maths workbooks was used for the books that teachers actually find useful and are using? Does she have any feedback from teachers? She’s indicated she gets feedback on the SMART (Student Monitoring, Assessment and Reporting Tool). Any formal feedback on the maths workbooks being used and that teachers are actually finding them useful?

In terms of staffing, the staffing is driven by student numbers; it is demand driven. I appreciate the member may not know that, but importantly for the first time ever in secondary school this year, I’ve made sure that the ministry knows where the gaps are in secondary schools. So previously we’ve known where there are teacher shortages in primary and secondary. When we came in, we made it by region as well, and now we’ve also asked for really good data on where we are short of certain subjects. That’s not something that any Government previously has ever asked before until we got here, because we’re interested in data and being able to then make sure that we are directing resource to those particular areas.

I’ve made some announcements around the School Onsite Training Programme—upping those numbers to 705 teacher trainees every single year from 2028, and 650, I think it is, from next year. That has been a phenomenally successful programme. What we will be able to do in the future, when we get these numbers in which particular subjects we’re short of, we’ll be able to use that data alongside the School Onsite Training Programme to direct resource into getting more of those, for example, biology, physics, chemistry teachers that we might need.

Going back to the member’s question around the SMART (Student Monitoring, Assessment and Reporting Tool), I’m advised the whole-of-life cost for SMART over 10 years is expected to be $177 million.

Briefly around the member’s question earlier about a certain scientist mentioned in the science curriculum, what I would suggest that the member does is go and look at the final curriculum; it’s very different than the draft. We took quite a lot of feedback from the sector on content and exactly the thing that the member has just mentioned—whether or not certain things are required. When we put out a draft, you’ve got to remember, we put it out at about what I’d determined to sort of be 80 to 90 percent correct—well, not correct, but where it needs to be—because we want feedback from the sector. We took thousands of pieces of feedback from the sector. When you look at the new science curriculum that has now been put out—the final version—it is quite different than the one that you are mentioning in your questions today, and that is because of that great feedback. So if you just get the up-to-date document, that will clarify things for you.

In relation to some of the other questions that you mentioned, the climate change - related content is in the social sciences curriculum. I understand, since this has been mentioned when talking to my officials, that climate science is actually quite complicated and sits up in the senior secondary curriculum and it is there. But when you are doing junior science—and you’ve got to also remember that our primary school teachers have to teach everything; mathematics to science to music to English to art and everything—the science that we provide them, and for children as young as five, it is very basic science. Increasingly complex up to year 8, but we really hit that complex climate science in the senior secondary curriculum.

Look, in terms of the Treaty of Waitangi, you are conflating two things. There is world history, and I’m really proud of the fact that we are teaching children about the history of humanity and New Zealand’s place in the world, and, yes, we are teaching the ancient Egyptians and the ancient Greeks and Romans. I’ll tell you why we’re teaching Pompeii, because for little five and six-year-olds, we’re saying to them, “What is it that Māori children play with? What did they play with? What did the settler children play with? What do you play with? Guess what? In Pompeii, we’ve seen buried in ash what children back then played with as well.” So we’re bringing in something that children understand, which is toys when they’re six years old, to understanding about the concept of time before, after, present, and drawing in Māori children, settler children, youth, and children who lived a really long time ago to give them that sense of history and our place in the world. We’re doing it in such a way that we’ve had really, really good feedback on that. I understand there’ll be some members in the House who think we should only do New Zealand history; we just have a different view. We think we should understand about where we came from and our place in the world as well as New Zealand history. Also, I do want to point out that we are introducing Waitangi Day and the origins of it really early—in fact, it’s as early as year 1 and it builds up over time.

CHAIRPERSON (Maureen Pugh): Who’s going to call?

I just had a follow up. Thank you so much for that figure of $177 million—I’m very appreciative. But could you tell me how much you’ve spent so far and also what’s left? So out of that $177 million allocated over a 10-year period, how much of that has been spent to date? I’d be really interested to know that. That’s in relation to the SMART (Student Monitoring, Assessment and Reporting Tool). I wanted to know also, has there been any calculation within the ministry when you add up things like the contract Learning First, the contract of SMART tool, the overseas curriculum development and curriculum materials such as the maths workbooks—so there’s been quite a shift into contracts going to providers that are not New Zealand providers. Has there been any kind of analysis of the total amount spent on outside contractors at the expense of New Zealand, and is that an exercise that the ministry does?

One of the things that when I was in Opposition I spent a lot of time doing was learning about the education sector and going around and visiting schools and understanding what worked well for them. I was in a lot of schools that used resources that they were able to fund themselves through their operational grants or through board funding. I saw the inequity in the system and the fact that they were able to use resources where other schools couldn’t and they were getting really great results where other schools were not able to because they couldn’t afford those resources.

When we implemented the maths curriculum, we knew that the silver bullet to improving maths achievement was not just a curriculum. It had to sit alongside teacher learning and development—professional learning and development (PLD). It had to sit alongside assessment and making sure that we’re investing in those children who are falling behind through our maths intervention teachers, but we also needed to make sure that we were providing the resources consistently and equitably across the country, because it’s not fair that so many schools were able to access them and so many weren’t. We didn’t make it compulsory—they didn’t have to order them, if they didn’t want to—and we didn’t prescribe how they had to use them. But what we did know was that teachers were spending hours and hours and hours finding resources, creating resources, and going to Twinkl Box and going on Facebook, trying to find resources to teach mathematics. What we wanted to be able to do was say to them “Actually, here is a resource that’s aligned to the curriculum and that has all of the practice pages that you need, alongside a teacher guide that, should you require it, will help step you through, lesson by lesson.”, and we’ve funded that across the sector.

When we went out for the request for proposal (RFP), we opened it up to everybody—

Hon Willow-Jean Prime: With te reo Māori funding?

Hon ERICA STANFORD: Interestingly, we also did it in te reo Māori, as well. The pāngarau resources have been fantastic. I notice that the previous Government didn’t do that, but we have because we’re equitably resourcing a bilingual education system.

All of those things together are raising maths achievement. When we went out to the RFP, we opened it up to everybody, but we had criteria that meant that you needed to meet a certain number of things, which meant that the textbooks, the workbooks, and the teacher guides had to meet the new curriculum, and for changes that we made, they would need to be met again. The people that met that criteria were the ones that were selected.

We don’t make it compulsory, as I’ve already said, for schools to use them. Schools use them in all different manners. Some schools use them religiously every day and stick to the programme; others use it as a tool when they’re doing maths practice, and that’s exactly what we’d expect. It’s a flexible resource, but the key thing is that every single school across the country has access to these free resources, which are available in both English and te reo Māori, and the great thing is the fact that now we’re starting to see results. It is not only the hour a day for maths books, the PLD, the new curriculum, the assessments, and the intervention when children are starting to fall behind, but now we are starting to see an improvement in mathematics for the first time in a really long time. In fact, in every single year group, there was an increase in the Curriculum Insights and Progress Study, but particularly at year 6, which is usually where we see a big drop-off.

While I understand where the member is coming from, this was all about creating consistency and equity across the sector to make sure that everyone has access to the same high-quality resources. New Zealand companies are equally able to vie for any of those.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Just to the Minister of Education, and continuing on the curriculum, with the new social science curriculum there is no budget in 2026 that’s specifically for additional funding for the junior curriculum for social sciences. Where will the funding for the implementation of the social science curriculum come from?

The senior science curriculum that was given was around $18 million a year, to 32,000 secondary school teachers. That’s, roughly, about $580 per teacher. Per teacher, what does the Minister intend the teacher to get out of that $580 per teacher for the secondary curriculum refresh?

Continuing on with Te Tiriti o Waitangi, I do like the idea that children should be exposed to different cultures, but we do also have an obligation in Aotearoa around upholding Te Tiriti o Waitangi. With that, what is the Minister’s response to the Waitangi Tribunal’s Wai 3553 memorandum-direction on pausing the changes to the curriculum and implementation of the curriculum, and, finally, if it is the case that the Minister is responsible for Māori-Crown relations, then how would the Minister respond to the disestablishment of Ngā Poutoko Aromatawai Māori from the New Zealand Qualifications Authority?

In terms of the junior curriculum resources for professional learning and development, we already have budget existing that we are using for that. We didn’t need to have anything in this Budget. We’ve got plenty already in existence.

In terms of the split, yes, I agree that we do have an obligation to teach New Zealand history and the foundations of our country. We also have an obligation to teach children about the history of the world. We are doing both and we’re doing it really well, and, actually, the feedback I’ve had back on this new curriculum has been overwhelmingly positive. Yes, there are a couple of things in there around signposting the climate changes, but overall it’s been phenomenally successful.

In terms of the Waitangi Tribunal, I acknowledge the request that they have made. My obligation is to make sure that next year, teachers who are required to teach social science and science have the information that they need as quickly as they can possibly get it. That’s why those curriculum documents and others will be released to give teachers plenty of time to be able to get to grips with the new content and understand it, but when that ruling does come in, we will certainly consider it seriously.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I’ve actually got the memorandum from the Waitangi Tribunal in front of me, which was dated 7 August, where they ask the Minister to specifically consider deferring the release of all updated New Zealand Curriculum and Te Marautanga o Aotearoa content until after the Waitangi Tribunal’s stage 2 report has been released. Now, the Minister has previously said in the House how important the Crown-Māori relationship is to her and how important Te Tiriti o Waitangi is and her obligations under Te Tiriti, and yet she is ignoring the request of the Waitangi Tribunal to defer the release of those documents. Whatever her answer just then, that overrides it, and that’s far more important.

I point out that in their memorandum, they actually said that they are concerned, along with the removal of school board’s Treaty obligations, that the Crown’s curriculum reforms may dilute prior emphasis on the importance of incorporating local content from te ao Māori into school teaching and learning. It also shares the concerns that the parties have with the flaws in the curriculum content, which may be symptomatic of insufficient engagement and input from Māori and the education sector. So the question about whether the Crown has satisfied its Treaty obligations of partnership and active protection of taonga Māori is a matter we are taking seriously.

Thirdly, they also said that they consider that the views that came up in that around overall feedback being received during consultation, that concern that there’s going to be insufficient time between the conclusion of the hearings, the proposed release of the report, and the curricula for any meaningful feedback to be incorporated in the curriculum documents. So, Minister, given that you’ve said you take your responsibilities under Te Tiriti so seriously, why are you just ignoring the Tribunal?

Thank you. As I’ve already pointed out, of course I’ve said back to the Waitangi Tribunal that we will consider their findings when they come out. Also—

Hon Willow-Jean Prime: Oh, token.

Hon ERICA STANFORD: If you want to hear the answer, I suggest you just zip it for a bit, because this constant barrage is not helping you or anyone else, frankly.

CHAIRPERSON (Maureen Pugh): Well, actually, it helps me completely.

Hon ERICA STANFORD: As I’ve already said, we will take any findings seriously, but it is important that I’ve got competing interests that I have to balance. I’ve got competing interests of thousands of teachers who are going to be required to teach the new curriculum, being able to teach the new curriculum, being able to see the content as early as possible—and I would note from that side of the House that they have made comments around the speed and we have to give teachers more time; that’s exactly what we are trying to do. In short, we are putting out the final documents so that teachers have plenty of time to be able to—

Hon Willow-Jean Prime: But you didn’t properly consult on it or develop it.

Hon ERICA STANFORD: Also, in relation to, again, the continuing barrage across the House, when we were developing the curriculum, we went out to hundreds of experts and teachers and academics, including Māori as well, who helped us to develop not only the New Zealand Curriculum but Te Marautanga o Aotearoa. I’d really make the point that we have written curriculum documents and Te Marautanga that never existed before. There are dozens of new curriculum areas that are now available that weren’t before, and we’ve done that in consultation with Māori.

I’d also make the point that the Waitangi Tribunal have made their initial findings based on old curriculum documents, not the up-to-date ones. So if we haven’t already, we will be providing them with the new curriculum documents so that they’ll be able to make their findings. I’ve already said that we will take those findings very seriously when they come in. I know that the tribunal knows our time frame, and they are working quickly to make sure they can get us their findings based on the new curriculum documents. I’ve already told them that we’ll take their feedback seriously, and I expect that their position may change a little bit, because the curriculum has changed so much since the drafts were put out.

I wanted to give my colleagues a good run at the guts of that, but the Minister of Education has intimated towards equitable funding across kura. I know that Budget 2026 allocates $310 million to the expansion of the school property portfolio. The Minister’s made a $62.5 million announcement for the same infrastructure investment into Te Waipounamu, which, of course, includes Te Tai Tonga, but there is really yet to be any clarity around how much investment the kaupapa Māori portfolio will get in terms of what’s required to bring its infrastructure just up to being on par with what I would call the bottom rung of the mainstream sets of infrastructure.

Of the $310 million - odd that are proposed for developing school property, what proportion of that is being committed to the kaupapa Māori field? I say kaupapa Māori field and its delivery modes to include kura kaupapa Māori, kura ā iwi, bilingual, and full-immersion delivery, and kura auraki in mainstream schools—not to silo them out. Also, of the $62.5 million that was invested into Te Waipounamu, none of that was directed towards any of those kaupapa Māori delivery models. What can Te Waipounamu and Te Tai Tonga expect in terms of investment into our kaupapa Māori education models that have languished behind for many, many decades now—what can they expect to see coming their way?

I think we’ll just leave it there for now, but this type of kōrero—and it slots straight in there with the kōrero about Te Tiriti o Waitangi, and your bringing in the equity and distribution of funding type take [topic], Minister—at the core, really, of improving, growing, and expanding kaupapa Māori education. What we know in the South is that demand outstrips supply, and has done for a long time, and is increasing. If you take a look at the Te Tira Hou report, it states that only 2.9 percent of Māori students in Te Waipounamu are in either Māori medium education or kaupapa Māori education—so any one of those three delivery modes that I mentioned—yet the demand for that is much, much higher. If you can give some advice around that, that would be great.

Thank you. As I said earlier, we have a commitment to equitable resourcing of a bilingual education system, and I mean that. Everything that we have done, we have made sure that we’re thinking about Māori resources, Māori property, Māori professional learning and development, Māori teachers exactly the same, at the same time. We are starting from very different standing points, though. We have a lot of ground to make up. I think you’ve already noted that so many of those kura kaupapa schools have been placed into schools that have been abandoned or sites that are not fit for purpose, and we have got a really big backlog.

In the last two Budgets, we ringfenced $50 million in funding. We are still using that funding. In this, while there was funding for Ngāringaomatariki, up North, which we are moving off the site that they’re on into a completely new site, which has already started, and they’re getting solar as well, we still have funding available to do all the projects that we’ve got in the pipeline. But, no doubt, in future Budgets there will be more that will be required.

The thing that I’m really proud of is the fact that we are the first Government ever to include kura kaupapa education, not just Te Rūnanga Nui o Ngā Kura Kaupapa Māori o Aotearoa (TRN) but also Ngā Kura ā Iwi o Aotearoa, in network planning. We’ve never considered that before, and here we are doing that now with a really good relationship with Tūmatakahuki, who are going to help us work out where the demand is, because what I’m afraid of is that we build places in, for example, primary school, yet we don’t have early childhood education provision to be able to feed up into it. That’s why I’ve asked them to work out where the need is, where we have lumpy provisions, so that we can create that kōhanga reo all the way through to wharekura and we can even it out. We’ve never done that before in a proper network planning way and involve Māori to help us do it, and that’s what Tūmatakahuki are helping us to do.

I am really proud of the work that we’ve done in Māori property. We moved Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Hawaiki Hou out of a bank vault. They were in a bank vault for, I think it was, 8 years—they were in a bank in town. We’ve moved them out to Cobham. We’ve re-done all of their classrooms. [Interruption] I don’t understand why the Opposition is sniping about this. This is an amazing thing. Actually, frankly, under your Government they were waiting for it, and you didn’t do it. I know it hurts, the fact that we’ve done it and you didn’t, but you know what? I actually care about tamariki Māori.

CHAIRPERSON (Maureen Pugh): I wasn’t responsible, Minister.

Hon ERICA STANFORD: Sorry. Not only that, yes, we’re moving Te Whānau Tahi into a new site in the South Island as well. Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Ngā Mokopuna, just across here in Wellington—full school redevelopment. When I went there to tell the young students that they were getting a library for the first time, they were over the moon. Also, Ngāringaomatariki up North as well—the only kura kaupapa in between Auckland and Whangārei—moving them to a whole new site. I was in Whakatāne the other day—it wasn’t a kura kaupapa, but it was an immersion school that is a special character school who worked with us. They had a bespoke design, and we went back and said, “Actually, we can deliver something at half the price.”—well, a lot cheaper; it may not have been half the price but in half the time. We delivered them almost a whole school rebuild as well. They were absolutely over the moon about it.

Because we’ve been able to reduce the cost of building, we’ve been able to deliver more, and that $50 million each year that we’ve ringfenced into Māori education has been able to go further, and we are still using it. I am really, really proud of the relationship that I have with not only TRN and Ngā Kura ā Iwi but Tūmatakahuki as well, working towards making sure we’ve got really good network planning, so there is kōhanga reo all the way through to wharekura provision. That has not always been the case, and we do have a long way to go before we get there, but we are investing every single year into making sure that that happens.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I would really like to know, given this is the Estimates debate and we have the Ministry of Education in here and the Minister here, how much of the $177 million allocated has been spent to date. The purpose of this debate is to understand the Budget. I’ve asked a pretty clear question; you’ve given me $177 million for 10 years. We would like to know—I would like to know; New Zealand would like to know—how much of that $177 million on the SMART (Student Monitoring, Assessment and Reporting Tool) has been spent to date.

If the Minister and the ministry are unable to answer that question, that is a sad indictment upon the New Zealand democracy and even Public Service—if we’re unable to produce the figure of how much you’ve spent on a tool, while we’re in the committee of the whole House with the specific purpose of examining the Estimates. Before the time is up, I would love to hear how much of the $177 million allocated for the SMART tool over a 10-year period has been spent to date.

I’m advised by my officials that we’ve budgeted to spend $25 million in 2025-26 and $13 million in 2026-27, and we can confirm actual spend in the annual review later this year.

CHAIRPERSON (Maureen Pugh): We’ve got time for one quick question—Lawrence Xu-Nan.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Just noting, in the Budget, that there’s been cuts to Positive Behaviour for Learning and there also hasn’t been any increase to Incredible Years. What is the Minister of Education and the Government doing to address the issue of racism in schools?

A final couple of questions: on charter schools, we see a boost to charter schools funding. Can the Minister elucidate for the committee what is the average class size of a charter school?

Just in response to the member’s first question, around Positive Behaviour for Learning (PB4L), the core of PB4L still exists—it has not been removed. There are some pilot programmes that were around it that were still in pilot that we’ve removed. One of them was because the local iwi weren’t interested in working with us in that particular pilot any more, and others weren’t achieving the outcomes. We’ve taken that funding and put it into other initiatives, but the core of PB4L still exists in schools for the purposes that you mentioned.

Look, in terms of charter school enrolments, I don’t have that exact number to hand—the average class size—but what I do know is that numbers have risen by about 18 percent. There has been really strong demand, and there are some new schools that are going to be opening that I know there will be strong demand for. I know Dane from Autism New Zealand has had an application that has been accepted.

Those are the types of schools that are going to really change the landscape and change outcomes for some New Zealand students who need a different type of environment or different type of school to be able to thrive. That’s the whole purpose of charter schools: to offer choice and something different. I can tell the member—I’ve just been handed something—that number of charter schools currently open is 19, and the total enrolled students, the latest figure I have, at July 2026, is 1,732.

CHAIRPERSON (Maureen Pugh): Members, the Minister’s time in the chair has come to an end. We now have the Minister of Justice.

Committee of the whole House—Estimates Debate

Justice

CHAIRPERSON (Maureen Pugh): Members, the Minister of Justice is available to speak to his portfolio from 4 o’clock to 5 o’clock.