Estimates Debate — Education

Members, the Minister for Social Development and Employment’s time in the chair has come to an end. We now have the Minister of Education. The Minister is available to speak to that portfolio from now until the dinner break, and I give the first call to Carl Bates, the deputy chairperson of the Education and Workforce Committee.

Thank you, Madam Chair. As deputy chair of the Education and Workforce Committee, it is my privilege to speak on Budget Estimates for 2025-26 for Vote Education. This year’s Budget, as the Minister told the committee, included the largest investment into learning support in a generation. Budget 2025 includes $645.8 million for operational funding and just over $100 million for capital funding for learning support initiatives over four years.

In addition, Budget 2025 extended the early intervention service through to the end of year 1 at primary school. About $192 million is allocated over four years to fund that provision. An additional $43 million funds additional speech language therapists, psychologists, and teacher-aide hours. Furthermore, the Ongoing Resourcing Scheme, known as ORS, has traditionally been funded via a fixed budget. From Budget 2025, it will now be demand-driven. If a child is eligible for ORS, they will have access to it.

Contrary to the belief of some, the facts are that the total Vote Education budget has had an overall increase in spending of about $429 million, with the five largest areas of spending being $8.7 billion for primary and secondary education, $3.4 billion for school property portfolio management, $3 billion for early learning, and $1.8 billion for Ministry of Education capital expenditure, as well as $1.6 billion for outcomes and target groups.

My question for the Minister: is she as excited as the principals I spoke to on Friday, who said learning support sparks up optimism about the learning support allocation starting in 2026, as a result of this Budget?

Thank you, Mr Speaker—oh, Madam Chair, I should say; old habits. Can I just start by saying this was a transformational Budget. One of my key six priority areas was learning support. We learnt when we were in Opposition but also from being the Minister that a key priority needed always to be a serious investment in learning support. For too long, we have been having meetings and creating strategy documents and having a think about it and have been tinkering around the edges. Meanwhile, children sat on wait-lists. The child was not getting the right service at the right time for far too long.

We put a lot of effort into working with the sector to find out what it was that they needed. They talked to me about a number of different things, and we’ve allocated those into a tiered-system approach, starting with universal support. One of the things we found that the principals were telling us from across the country was that the previous allocations of learning support coordinators were inequitable. The second tranche that was always promised never came. It was extraordinarily disappointing. There were some regions of New Zealand that only had 18 percent coverage of learning support coordinators.

This historic Budget, which is the largest investment in a generation, of three quarters of a billion dollars will go to solving that inequity problem with learning support coordinators. It was just in the last week or so that we were able to go out to all schools and say to them when they could expect their learning support coordinator—either next year, the following, or the year after that—so that they all know and can plan. I know that schools in the great electorate of Whanganui were very excited, including Kane from Aberfeldy School, who said that that was the best news that he’d almost ever received. It is going to make a huge difference on the ground.

There is so much more than that. That extension of learning support through early childhood to the end of year 1 is something that teachers and principals have been crying out for for so long. It now means that when a child turns five, they will continue to get the same support that they got before. What used to happen was it would stop and you’d have to start again, and it would be months before you could get that learning support back on stream. That was a huge loss to those young people who needed support. We are flooding in resources. This is hundreds of millions of dollars into early intervention support, and we are taking a social-investment approach because we know that the earlier we intervene into these young people’s lives, the better their outcomes are for learning.

That does mean a lot more early intervention teachers—hundreds of them. It does mean a lot more educational psychologists and speech language therapists. One of the questions I’ve had from around the country—I front-footed this in my Budget speech—was: where are all of these people going to come from, Minister? I’ve said to the sector, “We are agnostic about where the support comes from.” We are working very differently now. It may not be that the ministry employs that educational psychologist. Where there is private provision, we will use it. Where there is an NGO, we will use it. Where there is philanthropy, we will use it. All we want and all parents want is for the service to get to the child. We will make sure that that happens, and we’re going to work in a very different way to ensure that those wait-lists are reduced.

There’s not only that but also, as a previous speaker mentioned, the ongoing resource scheme (ORS), for our very highest learners. I remember, when I became the Minister of Education, there was a certain official who said to me, “Minister, you will never make this demand-driven.” What I would like to say is that I had one meeting with the Minister of Finance, and I asked her if we could make this demand-driven rather than a set budget, and she said yes, because she gets it, she cares, and she understands. That now means that if a child is eligible for ORS, they will get it. There will be no more raiding from other budgets or making it really difficult to get the scheme. They will get that support that they need. This will be hundreds and hundreds and hundreds—up to 1,700—children additional over the next few years. It is a huge amount, and that will kick in from next year. It is very, very exciting for those families who know how difficult it is.

We know, from across all of these announcements, the amount of teacher-aide hours that will be provided will hugely increase. From next year, it’s an additional 900,000 hours, building up to 2 million hours by 2028. That’s a huge amount next year and more thereafter up to 2028—an additional 2 million hours from every year into the ongoing resource scheme and into the early intervention scheme. Teachers have been crying out for more help in the classroom to get those waitlists cleared, to get more support for their children in need, but also to make sure that there were those learning support coordinators. All the things that teachers have been asking for for many, many years and that they’ve been fighting for, now they have them, and I’m extraordinarily proud of that.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I just want to say that we’ve had our time cut short here today, so I hope that our questions can be short and sharp and our answers can be short and sharp as well.

To the Associate Minister, I’d like to ask three early childhood education (ECE) questions. I’m not going to give a preamble, but, basically, how much funding, if any, for Budget 2025 was freed up specifically pausing or stopping ECE sector pay equity claims? How much of that, if any, went back into ECE? Does the Associate Minister recognise that qualifications, skills, and experience should matter for new ECE teachers? If so, how does changing the way that pay parity, as he has announced, for new teachers coming into the profession—how will that encourage new teachers into the profession when they’ve had their pay parity, basically, cut?

Thank you, Madam Chair, and I thank the Labour member for her questions. In relation to her first question—what sort of money was freed up from potential early childhood pay equity claims—the answer to that is none, because it was held in contingency. As to what amount was held in contingency on behalf of early childhood education (ECE), I don’t have that figure. I’d be happy to ask the Minister responsible, which is the Minister of Finance, for that information, if indeed it exists.

The second point that I would make about, I think she said, skills, experience, and qualifications in relation to an early childhood educator’s ability to educate children: well, you know, clearly, those things are extremely important. The question that I think people interested in this area should be thinking about, personally, is who decides? At the moment, under the pay parity scheme, you continue to be promoted and get additional pay each year for being there, and prior to these pay parity changes, you also entered the scheme at a certain level based on formal qualifications. I just make the point that as I move around New Zealand and I visit many early childhood centres, I have enormous admiration for the people that work in the centres and enormous admiration for the people who operate the centres. In my view, those people should have more say about how they apply their funding to remunerate the teachers, because it’s they who can judge the skills, experience, and value of the qualifications of the teachers better than perhaps a rather rigid framework set out in Wellington.

To answer the final question, I think the changes we’ve made to pay parity will really enhance the value of teachers and skills, experience, and qualifications, because the people closest to the situation—the people with the blood, sweat, and tears on the floor of the ECE—will be able to apply their judgment to those remuneration decisions to a greater extent than they could before.

One very short question, again following on from the Hon Jan Tinetti on early childhood education (ECE): why did the Associate Minister of Education go ahead with setting up a ministerial advisory group (MAG) for an ECE funding review when that was against Treasury’s advice, especially now we see there are already members of that MAG who have left the MAG?

Well, first of all, the great thing about our democracy is that the people can vote for whoever they like. Maybe one day you’ll be able to vote for the Treasury, but the Treasury wasn’t on the ballot at the last election. These people over here were elected to make decisions, so the fact that we’re not doing everything the Treasury tells us to—that’s called democracy.

The second point is the Treasury’s perspective is not the only one that matters. I’m interested in the perspective of the parents, I’m interested in the perspective of the teachers, I’m interested in the perspective of the taxpayers, and I’m also interested in the perspective of the schools that early childhood centres are feeding into. They’ve all got perspectives. What I hear from people is that the way that early childhood education funding is done in New Zealand is not really intentional. It’s a little bit like a sedimentary rock. It’s layered up over many decades as different Governments have put different policies in place. We have put together, under the chairpersonship of Linda Meade, a really talented group of people. It is true that we’ve had one person depart, and yet we have rapidly been able to replace them with an equally, if not more, skilled person. I think that is an enormously positive outcome for New Zealanders, because we’re going to have an under-the-hood look at getting our early childhood funding right.

Thank you, Madam Chair. The Government has removed or completely rewritten the curriculum framework Te Mātaiaho so that it is almost unrecognisable. The Government has refreshed the refreshed draft curriculum for English and maths. It has minimised te reo Māori, references to Te Tiriti, and mātauranga Māori in many curriculum areas. My question to the Minister is: how much money is budgeted for recolonising the curriculum?

Further to that, during the Estimates, at select committee the Minister said this. My question to the Minister is: why did she justify the lack of dedicated funding for Māori education by claiming that all brains learn to read the same and so the investment is going into structured literacy for everyone instead?

As far as it relates to the Budget, I’ll answer those questions, and the second one does because it talks about investment in Māori education. If the member would like to go to the Ministry of Education website, there is an entire document about the investment into Māori education in this Budget, which totalled $100 million of many really important initiatives, one of which, and the biggest of which, of course, is into property—there is $60 million going into property.

There are a number of other initiatives in this Budget, none of which are around structured literacy in the Māori education budget. In terms of structured literacy and raising achievement, if the previous Minister is interested, she should visit some schools who are doing structured literacy and are seeing incredibly accelerated learning for their tamariki Māori. There’s one in particular that I mention a lot because it was extremely impressive when I was up at Kerikeri Primary School up in Northland. They have accelerated Māori achievement in structured literacy through having a dedicated teacher workforce but also through having structured mathematics as well, and their Māori students are now achieving at the same rate as every other child.

You’ve got to remember that most Māori children are in the mainstream. When we look at what is going to make sure that we’re accelerating that achievement, we are looking across the board at things that make the biggest difference: structured literacy, structured maths, the science of learning.

With regard to the comment that she made about “all brains learn the same”, it was a particular question that I was asked in the select committee around learning to read and the difference between long-term and short-term memory, which is a crucial underpinning of the science of learning, and if the previous Minister is interested, she could read up about it. Essentially, what it says is that the short-term memory can hold only a small number of things. The underpinning of structured literacy is that you need to retain things in your long-term memory, and that is the same for all brains. There is no brain that I’m aware of that can hold inordinate amounts of knowledge in its short-term memory, as that would create cognitive load issues. That was the context for that.

There is a $100 million Māori education budget. There is also an extraordinarily huge amount of money going into curriculum design, and resources are available to make sure that we are accelerating learning for all students, including tamariki Māori.

Thank you, Madam Chair. The Minister didn’t answer my first question, which was: how much money is budgeted for recolonising the curriculum? In fact, I’ll point out that in the Minister’s answer, she talked about most Māori being in English-medium schools, and so that question is particularly relevant because it is the recolonising of that particular curriculum.

The member will be well aware that there wasn’t anything in this Budget for curriculum design.

Why does the Minister listen to people like Elizabeth Rata, with an established history of anti-Māori views?

I’m not sure that that’s actually an Estimates-related question.

Point of order, Madam Chairperson. This House has long-established conventions and Speakers’ rulings that a member should not be accused of being racist. I believe that it brings the House into disrepute if members use their free speech in this House to make a similar accusation against a member of the public, who cannot defend herself in this House. I think to uphold the mana of this House, that member should withdraw her comment. Otherwise, the public will lose faith in us having free speech, because they’ll see that we just abuse it.

Speaking to the point of order, this member of the public that Willow-Jean Prime has spoken about has a history of writing against Māori over the last generation. Māori have taken offence against this woman. Many academics and many Māori organisations—

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): OK.

Hon WILLIE JACKSON: —have opposed the writings of this woman. The woman—

I take the member’s point in speaking to the point of order, and I’d just ask the member to take his seat. We’re actually not here in a general debate. We are here in a sense that we are here to question the Minister on the Estimates of the Budget, and I think it would be most helpful if the members would actually take that course, and regardless of what people outside of this place have said, it isn’t helpful to use them in this particular debate. Can we stick to the Estimates, please.

Thank you, Madam Chair. It is relevant because this person that I have referenced is writing the curriculum, and so it is covered by the Budget that we are talking about.

Hon David Seymour: Point of order, Madam Chair.

Point of order, the Hon David Seymour. I haven’t asked the member to apologise; I’ve asked us to move forward as a committee of the whole House. Look, there is a view that’s held on this side of the Chamber that a particular person has had a view that they speak to in regard to education. What I’ve said is that it’s irrelevant to bring other people’s names into the Estimates. If we’re going to get the best out of this debate, we’re going to need to ask questions about the Estimates to the Minister. I haven’t asked that member to withdraw and apologise at this time.

Is that because you don’t believe that it brings the House into disrepute, because saying that someone is a racist person—which is what she said—

Hon Willow-Jean Prime: Anti-Māori.

Hon DAVID SEYMOUR: —yeah—and saying the person—

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): She was asking about that person’s influence on policy. I’m asking the member to stick to the debate.

Hon DAVID SEYMOUR: Well, she also made a reflection on the person. I mean, this is quite a serious point for the House, and it’s different from what Willie Jackson said.

Yeah, no, I say to the Hon David Seymour that we’re going to move forward into the Estimates debate so that we can get—

Hon David Seymour: OK. Well, I think that’s really sad.

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): —the best from the Minister. I’m sorry if the member disagrees with me, but we’re moving forward.

I do want to ask the Minister of Education if the Minister agrees with a certain person’s statement—just checking with the Chair that I can do that. This is publicly available information. I want to ask the—

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): If it relates to the Estimates—

Dr LAWRENCE XU-NAN: To the Budget, yes. I would like to ask if the Minister agrees with Michael Johnston, who went on The Platform to say that in terms of the current bill, the Education and Training Amendment Bill (No 2) that’s going through, Stanford is being “politically sensible to not remove it”—Te Tiriti—“at this point.” He points to Stanford saying in another interview “that Te Tiriti ‘would be considered under’ Minister Goldsmith’s ‘omnibus reform of legislation’, so avoiding a ‘fight with the school sector’ is the right thing to do while she’s focusing on driving curriculum reform.” Does the Minister agree with that, and, if not, how much of the Budget is driving the removal of Te Tiriti from curriculum and the Eurocentric ideology that is being pushed?

In answer to that, I didn’t hear that particular interview, so I can’t comment, but I would say that there is a huge amount of resource going into this Budget to raise Māori achievement. When I think about honouring the Treaty and Te Tiriti, I think about making sure that outcomes for tamariki Māori are equal to, if not better than, everybody else in the system, which is why there is so much resource going into providing equity of resource in te reo Māori, not only in structured literacy but in Panguru, where we’re making sure we’ve got professional learning and development for those teachers. This is from a previous Budget, but we’re making sure we are refreshing Te Marautanga as well, and there’ll be some announcements tomorrow about new curriculum areas within Te Marautanga. Everything we are doing is about honouring the Treaty to ensure that those young Māori who are coming through the education system have every opportunity to succeed, and that they are succeeding. I know that every parent wants their child to succeed. In terms of the specific question, there is nothing in this Budget relating to that particular bill that the member talks about.

Our follow-up question is: we have seen the statistics around the fact that ākonga Māori and kaupapa Māori-medium education do better at NCEA, so is what the Minister’s saying that the only way for ākonga Māori to achieve is through a Eurocentric pedological framework?

The member Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan is exactly right, which is why there is so much investment going into kura kaupapa Māori. We have spent a lot of time—I have spent a lot of time—with Ngā Kura ā Iwi and Te Rūnanga Nui talking about aspirations for their students and delivering on the things they have been asking for. In terms of that, one of the things we have budgeted for in this Budget is the Virtual Learning Network, which is making sure there are specialist te reo teachers around the country who are able to beam into classrooms in different parts of the country, because it can be very difficult to find a reo teacher who is a specialist in a particular area. They asked for that, and we delivered.

More to that, we’re also making sure we’re delivering literacy and maths resources for kura kaupapa Māori in te reo Māori that haven’t been produced before. There is more around professional learning and development. As I said earlier, it’s a $100 million package, $40 million of which is outside of building. As I have already said, they do get very good results, and we’re committed to building out that network. As I’ve said previously, for the very first time in this nation’s history, we are including kura kaupapa Māori in network planning. It has never been done before, which is why in every single Budget we are setting aside tranches of money to make sure we can continue to build those schools, and in this Budget, there was $60 million. In the previous Budget, there was $50 million. We’ll continue to do that.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I would like to move on now, actually, to NCEA. Budget 2025 doesn’t actually include anything about the scrapping of NCEA, which is currently being consulted on by the Minister. Can I just check with the Minister: how much has she budgeted or is she intending to budget in supplementary budgets for the scrapping of NCEA? Also, will she respond to the open letter by 121 principals?

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): The Minister’s just clarified that it’s not in the Budget.

Dr LAWRENCE XU-NAN: But this will have Budget implications, because it’s happening now.

Hon David Seymour: Give the other guy a go. I mean, he can’t be worse, or can he?

Shush up, David Seymour. Can I ask the Minister: has she consulted with Ngā Tapuwae college with regards to NCEA, where they’ve had some of the most successful results in terms of Māori students over the last few years, led by Arihia Stirling? We visited there recently, and obviously they want to work with the Government. I want to ask the Minister: has she worked with this school, which is one of te ao Māori’s most successful schools and also a real success in terms of South Auckland? Were they given any opportunity in terms of her strategy around NCEA?

I see that the Minister of Education didn’t answer the first questions around the Budget for the replacement of NCEA. We find it interesting, through others, not herself directly, that apparently there is no budget for it, when it is supposed to come into effect next year. What is the budget if this is to be approved? I think you’re trying to say that it’s not predetermined. What budget will be allocated, if this is approved, from next year’s Budget?

On that question, I think we are a little bit concerned by the fact that this is something that is happening within the financial year of Budget 2025, yet the Minister could not respond to the fact that something as major as replacing the qualification of Aotearoa New Zealand has been considered.

We are in a consultation phase. No decisions have been made. I was very clear in this year’s Budget when I talked about the massive investment, predominantly in primary schools, and I said that next year’s Budget would be a secondary Budget. We haven’t made decisions. Nothing has been budgeted for at this point because we’re only just at the very start of consultation, which is going to take some time. In terms of speaking with Ngā Kura ā Iwi o Aotearoa on te reo Māori, we have been doing, and I spoke with Arihia this morning.

Sorry, just one follow-up question around that. We see, in terms of the Budget document—particularly the Cabinet paper and the Budget paper that was released last week—that anything to do with the Budget is a long-term process, so what conversations has the Minister had with the Minister of Finance around something like this in anticipation to any changes to NCEA?

Thank you, Madam Chair. I mean, this is very difficult, because it is something that we’re talking about right now, and for it to be able to be effectively implemented, if it is to be approved, we need to know how much consideration the Minister has given to the funding that is going to be required for the effective implementation of this—for example, what budget is there for additional teaching and staffing and professional learning and development? What budget is there for industry skills boards, who are going to have the role of developing the curriculum and assessment under this proposal? Surely the Minister and the ministry have done some thinking about this, because if they haven’t and it starts next year, then we have a problem.

I suggest that given the Minister’s answer that this doesn’t involve Budget 2025, the Minister’s made it very clear. I suggest that questions are aimed at what is in the Estimates of Budget 2025 to get the best out of the session.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): You can ask a different question, but you’ll get the same answer.

Hon WILLOW-JEAN PRIME: No, but, Madam Chair, the Budget actually covers a forecast period. What is the forecast for this proposed change of overhauling the entire assessment framework? There’s significant amount of work that is going to need to go into the implementation of this, the staffing of this, the funding of the industry skills boards, if they are to have the roles. In the forecast period covered by Budget 2025 that has been released, what funding has been put aside for this?

I think it is peculiar that the four-year period that the Budget is in—I’m assuming that means that the Minister of Education has decided that NCEA changes will not happen until 2029, so we will see how that goes. Let’s look at NCEA in a different light. We’re looking at the qualification, but let’s talk about curriculum. The public has emailed us in terms of changes to some of the subjects, and particularly when it comes to the general academic subjects. What is in the Budget on the implementation of new curricula and new subject lists? Nothing? OK.

As the Opposition are failing to ask any questions, I thought I would help out with the whole procedure and start by just talking a little bit about the communities of learning, which I understand are being disestablished. I understand that there’s been some people who were concerned about that, but, overwhelmingly, there’s been a lot of success and also a lot of money that has been freed up that can be used for other purposes. I just wondered if the Minister might like to talk to the committee about the disestablishment of the—

Shanan Halbert: Point of order.

Hon DAVID SEYMOUR: —communities of learning and also about how the funds freed up have been applied.

Do I have a point of order? No, I don’t.

Very quickly, Madam Chair, because I am running out of my own speaking time. It’s nice to get—

Hon David Seymour: Oh, sorry.

Hon ERICA STANFORD: That’s OK. It’s a nice to get a question about this Budget rather than imaginary future Budgets. But it was something that the sector had called for very loudly. They wanted an extra learning support budget; they wanted additional funds put into the Ongoing Resourcing Scheme and teacher-aides and learning support coordinators, and they overwhelmingly lobbied me to disestablish the communities of learning or kāhui ako. We listened to their feedback. We have done that. We’re winding it down over a number of years while we power up the learning support budget, and it has been very, very well received by the sector.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I don’t know why the Minister did not answer the questions about curriculum and subjects. Regardless of the NCEA change programme, or entire scrapping of it that the Minister is proposing, curriculum is supposed to start next year. The ministry says it has been delayed but curriculum should be implemented in term 4 and then next year. Can the Minister please talk to the Budget for that as well as the professional learning and development to go with it?

In terms of this year’s Budget, there was plenty put aside for additional curriculum advisers, specialty secondary curriculum advisers, and the member will be able to find that in the information sheets that are printed on the ministry website.

In terms of professional learning and development, there is baselined money for ongoing professional learning and development. In terms of the—I know that the previous Minister’s very interested in the future, but the senior secondary subject areas will not be coming in for many years. There will be future Budgets that go to that, but they’re not in this Budget round, which is why it makes it difficult to answer questions when we’re talking about this particular Budget.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I’m so glad that the Associate Minister and the Minister of Education mentioned about kāhui ako, because can I check with the Minister that when in this Budget, kāhui ako has been removed, has the Minister consulted with unions, which was advised as a priority?

Just very quickly on that—because I am, as I said, running out of time. It was very interesting to note that when kāhui ako were established in the first case—many years ago, under a previous National Government, as it turns out—the people that railed against them at that time were the unions. I listened to them from that time but also listened to more of the evidence, which shows us that, actually, overall, the Education Review Office found that those schools who were part of kāhui ako—their results were very marginally worse than those who weren’t.

I just wonder if the Minister has any comments—perhaps with the assistance of one of her associates—on the Ka Ora, Ka Ako - Healthy School Lunches programme.

I’d have to refer to my associate to speak about that.

Thank you very much for this opportunity. I’d just like to say that I think it’s been absolutely—

Shanan Halbert: Point of order.

Hon DAVID SEYMOUR: Oh, here we go.

Shanan Halbert: The Minister has made herself unavailable for the remaining 16 minutes that we have for this session, and here we have the Associate Minister interrupting—

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): No, each party in the House has an allocated time in this debate. Now, we’ve just been through a period where the Opposition members have been asking questions which the Minister has clearly said do not relate to Budget 2025. On that basis, I’ve given the call to the Hon David Seymour.

Hon DAVID SEYMOUR: Thank you very much—

Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan: Speaking to the point of order, just one small clarification from you, Madam Chair: are you saying that a person can now ask themselves questions as a part of the Budget debate?

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): Well, the person actually asked it to the Minister, who delegated the Hon David Seymour to answer the question.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Look, I thank the Minister of Education for referring this very good question to me. I want to talk a little bit about how the Healthy School Lunches Programme is performing. In short, it is performing exceedingly well.

Last week, just to take one example, the delivery in full on time, or default, was 99.98 percent. Now, anyone involved in any kind of logistics delivery, that kind of business—and people do say this to me. They say, “What you’re achieving there”—well, it’s not me. They say that what the people delivering the Healthy School Lunches Programme, the School Lunch Collective, are achieving is actually quite extraordinary in the world of on-time delivery.

They’re also getting very, very positive reviews in terms of the quality. The term 3 menu was evaluated by groups of students. They gave it 73 percent approval. Now, if you talk to parents in this country, most would be pretty happy to get 73 percent approval for the lunches that they’re putting in students’ lunch boxes, so that is a big victory.

I think the other thing that’s critical to recognise is that this is being done for $130 million less than the previous programme. As primary schools come into the programme next year, as budgeted, there’s going to be an opportunity to increase that saving to over $170 million. Now, to put that in perspective, had the previous Government adopted this approach, they would have saved about $800 million of debt over five years, and that is debt that the young people at school would not have to pay, but, sadly, they will have to because of the inefficient programme that preceded this.

It’s also a really good example of actually celebrating something that works and backing change, because we had a lot of people who were very happy to pile in and criticise when we had some teething problems with the programme. What do you hear from those people today?

Grant McCallum: Crickets.

Hon DAVID SEYMOUR: Crickets. Crickets. Crickets. That’s what we hear from them, because they’re very happy to pile in, drag down, do the whole “pull them down” thing, but they’re not there to push up what is a success. I think it’s actually a very good example, and I would say to the people in the Ministry of Education and the School Lunch Collective: good on you for getting 99.98 percent on-time delivery; good on you for saving the taxpayer money at a rate that would have taken $800 million of debt off these young people.

We look forward to the programme in the next year rolling out to primary schools as well, as budgeted in the Estimates—which, for the Opposition’s information, is what we’re here to debate.

Tēnā rā koe e te Pīka, otirā tēnā rā koe e te Minita. I’ve been going up and down the country speaking with different whānau, different kura, different kaiako, and their biggest concern—particularly coming up to Te Wiki o Te Reo Māori next week—is that the biggest barrier that will keep tamariki Māori out of learning their language is actually waiting lists. Across the country, there’s about a thousand kids on waiting lists for puna reo. There’s about another estimated thousand kids on a waiting list for kōhanga reo. For the majority of kura kaupapa and wharekura—any full immersion school—you have to have had some learning of te reo Māori or have gone to kōhanga reo before entering into these fullimmersion schools. It’s hard for them to even get to that point when there are a thousand kids on those waiting lists. The realities for all whānau, actually, is that they’re having to put their tamaiti on the waiting list before they’re even born. There’s a five-year waiting list. The biggest concern across the country, actually, is waiting lists.

Historically, Māori education has been underfunded across the board, only getting, at most, 1 percent of the full Budget, no matter who’s in Government. I’d just really like to know from the Minister what in Budget 2025 is going to eradicate these waiting lists so that there are more resources and there’s some more capacity for Māori education for tamariki Māori across the board in Māori education. When it comes to resourcing and staffing and building capacity within our Māori education, what specifically is in Budget 2025? Tēnā rā koe.

I thank the member for her question; I thank all members for questions on early childhood. In relation to kōhanga reo, and te puna reo for that matter, in this Budget we have carried on with business as usual. However, in Budget 2024—I know we’re focused on this one—I just want to make the point that the Government did put a substantial increase in funding to help capitalise kōhanga reo in the previous year. I think that reflects the fact that the Government remains committed to offering choice, remains committed to supporting te puna reo and kōhanga reo, and as we work through the funding review, we will continue to do that. We’ve had a track record of investing and we will continue to do so. We didn’t make any changes in this Budget that we’re talking about, but that’s not a reflection of our commitment, which was shown in the previous Budget.

Thank you, Madam Chair. In what was perhaps the biggest sabotage of women’s rights in a generation, the Government ripped up, in one day, the pay equity regime in order to save their Budget. This particularly affected teachers, who saw their multiple pay equity claims cancelled, and for secondary schools, cancelled entirely—completely shut out from any future claims.

My question to the Minister is: is she comfortable being the Minister of Education who oversaw the daylight robbery of teachers’ rights to pay equity? Will the Minister commit, like the Associate Minister of Education did earlier, to asking the Minister of Finance what the figure was that was saved from the cancellation of those pay equity claims? I want that commitment. Further to that, how much of that money has gone back into education, perhaps paying for that learning support package she spoke about earlier?

Members, the time has come for the dinner break, but I just wanted to make one comment before we go to the dinner break, because I thought maybe if people had—this debate has been fairly frustrating from a number of fronts. If somebody’s got a spare half an hour, I suggest watching the debate between 9.30 and 10 p.m. last night, when Shanan Halbert was questioning the Hon Penny Simmonds and the Hon Dr Shane Reti—the homing in on questions relevant to Budget 2025. It was a far less frustrating time in the Chamber. I just do want to make that comment that those questions were really homed in on the Budget, and we’ve missed the point a wee bit in this session.

So, members, the time has come for the dinner break. We’ll resume the debate at 7.30 p.m.

Sitting suspended from 5.59 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.

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