Charter schools revived as bill passes final reading

Legislation re-introducing charter schools has passed its final reading in Parliament.

The third reading on Wednesday saw passionate speeches both for and against the bill, which revives the alternative education model.

The change, promised in National's coalition agreement with the ACT Party, has been spearheaded by ACT leader and Associate Education Minister David Seymour.

He told the House groups, including the Iwi Chairs Forum, had written to him expressing strong support for the re-introduction of charter schools.

"They [the Iwi Chairs Forum] know that communities know more about how to engage their children than the people in Wellington, most of the time.

"And so we're going to invite people and communities to start up schools and they're going to get the money the state would have spent on the same child at a state school...if, and this is important, high standards are met."

Read more:

• Charter schools: What are they, how are they different, and are they better than public schools?

Seymour said charter schools would be required to have high standards of attendance, achievement and financial probity.

New Zealand First MP Andy Foster said the change had been long-signalled to the electorate and was the coalition government keeping it promises.

"The simple concept here is that all of our children are not the same. One size does not fit all and it gives the opportunity for some diversification, some innovation."

Labour MP Camilla Belich said bringing charter schools back was a mistake that risked making children's education an experiment.

"It's an experiment and I tell you it is the worst type of experiment that a government can make; experimenting on our children.

"If this doesn't work the people who lose out are not the people sitting around this chamber, they are the people who are vulnerable children who miss out on having a good quality education that they would have got if you'd spent this money in the state system."

Green MP Lawrence Xu-Nan said the the legislation was not about education, but privatisation.

"Who actually benefits from this bill? It is not the children, it is not the teachers and it is certainly not the parents that they care so much about.

"It is the privatised companies, the overseas companies that want to come here and take New Zealand money."

National MP Carl Bates said some charter schools would be non-profit, arguing this undercut the opposition's criticism that the alternative education model was about making money.

"This is about lifting student achievement. The opposition are trying to characterise this bill [as] about being about the market, as opposed to being about ensuring we deliver opportunities for lifting student achievement here in New Zealand."

Te Paati Māori MP Tākuta Ferris said the Iwi Chairs Forum only supported the legislation because it funded education models "built on self-determination".

"Tino Rangatiratanga models of education have been in existence since 1981 and you've never supported them. Don't go fluffing you feathers like you're doing something good for it now because you're not."

The legislation passed with support from National, ACT, New Zealand First - with Labour, the Greens and Te Paati Māori opposed.