Cuts will fund apprentices

Bill English

National will axe some low-level tertiary courses, freeze spending on others and cut bureaucrats so more money can be ploughed into apprenticeship and workplace training.

Education spokesman Bill English said yesterday in releasing the tertiary policy that Labour had wasted hundreds of millions on low-quality courses while capping funds for apprenticeship and workplace training.

Education Minister Trevor Mallard immediately labelled National's plan "slash and burn" and warned it would send regional polytechnics under.

Mr English said community education courses would be axed. Labour had spent $65 million this year on such courses at polytechnics and wananga with no assessment, no qualification and no requirement for evidence that students actually did them.

National would also freeze spending on low-level certificate and diploma courses - which currently cost more than $600 million - while problems with the system were fixed.

Unspecified cutbacks would be made in the complex tertiary bureaucracy, which had failed "so spectacularly".

Mr English said a recent Government report had painted a picture of "confusion, infighting and downright incompetence" in the Tertiary Education Commission, Education Ministry and New Zealand Qualifications Authority.

National would also cut the $10 million it says Mr Mallard allocated last week for more tertiary bureaucrats. Savings from the policy would be redirected into apprenticeships and workplace training, which would be uncapped.

However, Mr English could not give a figure on how much was likely to be redirected into those areas.

He said it would take some time to sort out the mess in the tertiary sector.

"The Government has over the past five years spent over $2 billion on courses that students didn't complete. That $2 billion dwarfs any growth there's been in apprenticeship and trade training."

Mr Mallard said the policy was full of platitudes, adopted already-announced Government plans and repeated past mistakes.

He blamed the blowout in polytechnic and community education funding on National, saying it uncapped funding while in power in the 1990s.

"There was a mad scramble to sign up as many students as possible and quality suffered as a result. Uncapping funding for industry training would create exactly the same sort of incentives."

Mr Mallard recently announced his own cutbacks on low-quality courses, saying $160 million would be slashed. Balancing that, a $177.8 million fund over five years would help providers offer higher-quality courses.

The shakeup came after a review started when the Government was embarrassed by revelations millions was being spent on dubious courses such as twilight golf and Maori singalong lessons.

University Students Association co-president Andrew Kirton said National's plans could spell the return of the high student fee rises of the 1990s.

When National was last in power, fees rose by 12 per cent on average per year.

Other National plans are to:

* Reform polytechnic councils to ensure stronger accountability for academic and financial decisions.

* Introduce tougher quality requirements and consistent sanctions on providers where such requirements are not met. For example courses will be cut where more than half of students drop out two years in a row.

Mr English said National will release a trades and skills policy soon.

National's policy

* Abolish all polytechnic and wananga community education courses, which cost $65m this year.

* Freeze funding on low-level certificate and diploma courses, which currently cost over $600m.

* Make unspecified cutbacks in the tertiary education bureaucracy.