Further changes to Special Education 2000 are welcome but highlight the ad hoc nature of the policy's implementation, Labour education spokesperson Trevor Mallard said today.

Trevor Mallard said the Government had put the families of hundreds of children in special education attached units through more than two years of intense uncertainty which had created a huge amount of stress.

"This is not a brave step forward for Dr Smith. It is merely removing the uncertainty and the threat of closure from hundreds of attached units around the country," Trevor Mallard said.

"They should have never been put through the ringer like they have and it's a poor reflection on the implementation of Special Education 2000.

"This is the fifth patch-up job the Government has been forced to announce for this policy. If they listened more carefully to what people in the sector said, and acted on their advice, they would not have to constantly play catch-up," Trevor Mallard said.

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Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>