New Bill Gives Minister Power To Keep Making It Up As She Goes

Te Hautū Kahurangi | Tertiary Education Union notes yet another development in the ongoing saga of Aotearoa’s vocational education and training network that contributes nothing to stability or certainty to staff or students in the sector.

The Education and Training (Vocational Education and Training System) Amendment Bill was introduced into Parliament yesterday and anyone who was hoping it would provide new information on how the new system would be structured was left disappointed.

Te Pou Ahurei | National Secretary Sandra Grey sees no plan “apart from giving the Minister the power to keep making up the plan as she goes along. There’s still no indication of which polytechnics will stand alone, which will merge and which will be federated – the bill says all of that will be at the discretion of the Minister.”

“This legislation contributes nothing to the financial ‘viability’ of or the quality of education within the system or any individual or federated providers. It provides no certainty to our members, who still have jobs in depleted and neglected institutions, and have been scared of losing their jobs for longer than they can remember.”

“Once again Penny Simmonds continues the long tradition of successive governments rearranging the deckchairs and changing some names without addressing the underlying problem.”

“For the umpteenth time – our sector doesn’t have a structural problem, it has a funding problem.”

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