Government 'broke law' over Unitec

The Government is facing a $3.5 million lawsuit after being advised it broke the law in paralysing a polytechnic's bid for a new university.

Auckland's Unitec will file papers at the High Court in Wellington today claiming a Government block on its application to become the country's ninth university broke multiple laws.

Its legal case hinges on an application for status being suspended in 2000 while the Government tried to introduce legislation to limit the number of universities.

The Herald has obtained a letter from Steve Maharey, who was associate education minister (tertiary) at the time, to the Qualifications Authority, written in October last year.

Mr Maharey wrote: " ... the NZQA sought and has received advice from Crown Law to the effect that that suspension in 2000 was unlawful".

The bill was never passed - but Unitec's application was never considered either.

The court case brings to a head six years of growing animosity. The Auckland polytechnic has been battling since 1999 to join New Zealand's eight elite tertiary institutions.

The institution's chief executive Dr John Webster said yesterday: "Unitec has suffered significant loss as a consequence of unlawful actions by the minister and the Qualifications Authority and $3.5 million is a conservative estimate of that loss."

Proceedings will be lodged against Minister of Education Trevor Mallard and the Qualifications Authority.

They will claim the Government has breached article 1 of the Bill of Rights 1688, chapter 29 of the Magna Carta 1297 and the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990.

Unitec claims it has been scuppered at every attempt by a Government determined to prevent a fair and open assessment.

Dr Webster said legal action was the last step he wanted to take, but the Government had left him with no choice.

Although the application was now being considered, "we have lost confidence that our application will ever be determined fairly and reasonably without judicial intervention".

The Government maintains it is trying to streamline the process for assessing university applications.

But Unitec supporters believe the legislation is about confining polytechnics to a separate category from the "high-brow" cousins.

He said it was clear Unitec met the criteria for university status.

But the Government had a very traditional view of what a university was, and was "seriously out of touch" with international developments in the tertiary world, he said.

Bizarrely, Unitec claims the Government is on the verge of repeating its allegedly unlawful behaviour.

The latest application is under threat from a new law - the Education (Establishment of Universities) Amendment Bill, which was tabled in September last year.

If passed as law, the amendment would allow the education minister to decide whether an institution should be measured against university criteria without an actual assessment taking place.

In another letter written by Mr Maharey, he told Unitec it was the Government's intention that this Bill should be enacted before a decision was made on Unitec's application.

Dr Webster said the legal action would ask for the university application to be fast-tracked. Unitec is one of the largest tertiary institutions in the country and rated 12th of all tertiary institutes in the Performance-Based Research Fund rankings released last year.

But the institution's attempt to gain university status has met with open resistance from some quarters including the Vice-Chancellors Committee, which represents New Zealand's universities.

Yesterday, the Ministry for Education declined to comment pending the legal action.

National's education spokesman, Bill English, said Government opposition to Unitec becoming a university was "irrational and elitist".

"The best way to clean up this mess is for the Government to follow the current law and drop the ridiculous legislation currently before a select committee."

Unitec

* 50,425 students from 85 nations.
* Offers programmes from certificates to doctorates.
* Courses include performing arts, design, engineering, architecture, management and computing