The families
of school children should be horrified at the elevation of
David Benson-Pope to the Education portfolio, says
National's Education spokesman, Bill English.
"This is the
man who is on record as saying that sexually active
12-year-old girls are women.
"Helen Clark had no choice
but to remove Trevor Mallard from being in charge of schools
after his disastrous schools closure programme and his
subsequent U-turns, but it is a pity she didn't go the whole
way and sack him completely from the portfolio.
Mr English
also says Steve Maharey's sacking from tertiary education is
just desserts for the mess he made.
"His stewardship has
been a disaster, with hundreds of millions of dollars wasted
on courses that no one did. His policies were unsustainable
and his credibility was shot."
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