Illegal NZ shows need to rein in private education

Media Release
21 August 2009

Illegal NZ shows need to rein in private education

Last night’s episode of Illegal NZ, where journalist Tony Wall exposes a qualifications-for-cash scam at a New Zealand private training institution, is a warning about the dangers of for-profit education says TEU national secretary Sharn Riggs.

“It’s disappointing but sadly not surprising that there is at least one and probably more private training institutes that are willing to sell qualifications for cash, ” said Ms Riggs.

The New Zealand Diploma of Business that we saw Mr Wall’s colleague ‘Danny’ purchase for $12,000 last night was NZQA approved and came complete with an academic transcript.

“It would not be hard to work out from the details on the show which PTE or PTEs Mr Wall had dealings with. We call on the minister to investigate and close down any schools involved in this sort of corruption immediately. It undermines the high quality reputation that all of New Zealand’s public education institutions and many of its private training institutions have built up over many years.”

“This is an extremely serious issue, both for New Zealand’s international standing and for the students who study or have studied here. If the government is going to allow private companies to use our education system to make a profit off students then it needs to take more rigorous steps to make sure that those students are given the same high quality education that they could expect from our public education system,” says Ms Riggs.

The TVNZ episode of Illegal NZ outlining the cash for qualifications scam is available online at http://tvnz.co.nz/illegal-nz/s1-e7-video-2934088

ENDS