Trustees Association perplexed and outraged by Judge’s ruling

The New Zealand School Trustees Association is perplexed and outraged by a Tokoroa District Court Judge’s ruling that a North Island high school will be sentenced "…to prepare and present a safety presentation at the National Conference of the School Trustees Association in 2020".

NZSTA’s national conference is a matter between NZSTA and its member boards, and it is nobody else’s business to dictate who will or will not be invited to speak at it, says NZSTA President Lorraine Kerr. Invitations to speak at the NZSTA Conference are a privilege and highly sought after across the education sector and beyond.

"Addressing our conference is a reward, not a punishment thank you very much," Ms Kerr says.

Ms Kerr says she would have expected anyone making commitments or rulings on NZSTA’s internal business to have the common decency to speak to the organisation about it first.

"In this case, that means me and I can assure you that even though these incidents occurred over 12 months ago nobody has approached me about this, either internally or from Worksafe or the Tokoroa District Court. If they had, I would have sent them away with a flea in their ear," Ms Kerr says.

"I’m sure the judge meant well but they need to poke their nose back out of NZSTA’s internal business and refrain from sentencing innocent third parties when passing judgements on cases. We will not be accommodating this ruling, and we wouldn’t even if they had asked, which they haven’t." Ms Kerr says.

"I’m baffled as to why they would consider this an appropriate ruling to make, and outraged that they would be so arrogant and ill-informed as to make it without consulting us first.

"Worksafe should also know better. We have had a very good working relationship with Worksafe up until now. But if they’re going to take us for granted and ride roughshod over us like this I’m not so sure."

ENDS

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