Labour Featherbedding Private Education Staggering
Labour’s decision to dramatically increase funding for private early childhood centres is staggering!
More than $50 million is to be allocated to “for profit” Early Childhood Education Centres when the funding needs across
public education are manifest.
How did this suddenly leap to top priority when public education is so under-funded?
What about our public schools crying out for Operations Grant funding to meet the real cost of schooling?
What about our children with special education needs who are being daily “main-dumped” while schools lack the resources
to ensure they can be effective learners in the classroom?
What about our public schools in low income communities which are now 25% behind in funding compared to public schools
in high income communities?
What about our universities and polytechs where staff are poorly paid and student fees are increasing by up to 10% per
year?
The list goes on.
The Business Roundtable through its Education Forum has campaigned for this private funding for many months. Why has
Labour buckled to this pressure while it ignores pleas from the public sector?
The decision smacks of election featherbedding. The private early childhood and private tertiary education sectors have
seen dramatic increases under Labour over the past 6 years.
For example in the private tertiary sector government funding has increased from just $17 million when Labour came to
office to over $150 million per year now! Similar increases have been recorded in the private early childhood sector.
This latest Labour announcement is not difficult to understand. It is impossible!
John Minto
National Chairperson