NCEA ‘expert’ a political poodle

Teachers, parents and students can have no faith in the overseas ‘expert’ hired to review the NCEA because he is one of the architects of the system, says National’s Education spokesman Bill English.

Under questioning today in Parliament, Trevor Mallard revealed that Alan Barker was hired to provide expert advice to the inquiry into NCEA.

Mr English says it is bad enough that Labour has tried to hide the inquiry into the NCEA which is a much more significant backdown than the scholarship inquiry.

“But I am shocked to find that Mr Barker was the NZQA's general manager of policy and planning from 1990 to 1997.”

After he left NZQA, Mr Barker was a senior official at the State Services Commission, the body directed to carry out the inquiry. He was also an adviser to the former Labour Government's Education Minister between 1985 and 1990.

“Mr Barker has the ideal CV for a snow job – he was an architect of the NCEA, he knows the civil service and he will understand Labour’s political needs,” says Mr English

“Teachers, students and parents will be disgusted that their serious concerns are to be dealt with by a so-called expert with impeccable lapdog credentials.”

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