The complaint, lodged by a member of the public, concerns comments the teacher posted under a New Zealand First video titled “Winston Peters: We’re removing the indoctrination obsession from education.” The teacher criticised the Teaching Council for submitting against the Government’s Treaty Principles Bill, writing:
“The Teaching Council have recently made a submission AGAINST the Treaty Principles Bill on behalf of ALL teachers. Nobody asked me what my opinions are. I am a primary school teacher who is fed up with the indoctrination going on in the education sector. The Maorification of school life is going too far… What is NZ First going to do about this?”
The complaint alleges this comment breaches the Council’s requirement for “manaakitanga: creating a welcoming, caring, and creative learning environment,” and calls for the teacher to be required to complete an “Unteach Racism” programme.
McClure said the complaint is politically motivated and an attempt to punish someone for holding an unpopular view.
“This teacher has a right, like anyone else, to express their opinions freely on social media,” she said. “The Teaching Council cannot use its Code of Conduct to silence people having a political opinion outside the classroom. That itself would be a potential breach of the law.”
She also said teachers had contacted her directly to say they felt the Council’s submission did not reflect their views or speak on their behalf.
The Free Speech Union, which is representing the teacher, has written to the Teaching Council’s Investigations Advisor urging it to dismiss the complaint.
In a letter signed by senior in-house counsel Hannah Clow, the Union said the complaint is part of a growing pattern where individuals target professionals subject to regulation simply for expressing unpopular views.
“There has been a concerning trend of individuals actively searching online for those who express views they disagree with… solely to lodge complaints against them,” the letter said. “Such actions are often vexatious and unrelated to genuine concerns about a person’s ability to perform their role.”
The Union said teachers do not lose their civil liberties upon entering the profession and argued that the Council has no authority to regulate personal political commentary made outside the classroom.
“She is entitled to express her views on education without fear of a Teaching Council investigation,” the Union said. “This principle is fundamental to the values of a liberal democracy.”
The Free Speech Union warned that if the complaint proceeds further, it will publicly advocate for the teacher’s right to free expression.
In response, the Teaching Council declined to comment to chrislynchmedia.com on the specific case, citing confidentiality, but said all complaints are carefully assessed in line with the law.
“In general, the Teaching Council cannot comment on specific matters as these are private and confidential to those involved,” it said. “However, we are required to always carefully consider every complaint and mandatory report we receive. The teacher or their representative is always given the opportunity to respond before the Triage Committee makes any decisions.”
The Council said not all complaints lead to formal investigations, with around 40 percent of matters resolved at the triage stage without further action.
It also defended its professional standards and its submission to Parliament, saying the Code of Professional Responsibility was developed in consultation with teachers and reflects the expectations of the profession.
“All teachers are entitled to hold personal beliefs and ideologies,” the Council said. “It is possible to be true to your own beliefs and be a teacher. However, it is essential they do not use their position of authority to enforce, impose, or promote their views onto students.”
The Council said its top priority remains the safety and wellbeing of learners in the classroom, supported by high-quality, professional teachers.
Broadcaster Chris Lynch is an award winning journalist who also produces Christchurch news and video content for domestic and international companies. This article was originally published by Chris Lynch Media and is published here with kind permission.
“The Teaching Council have recently made a submission AGAINST the Treaty Principles Bill on behalf of ALL teachers. Nobody asked me what my opinions are. I am a primary school teacher who is fed up with the indoctrination going on in the education sector. The Maorification of school life is going too far… What is NZ First going to do about this?”
The complaint alleges this comment breaches the Council’s requirement for “manaakitanga: creating a welcoming, caring, and creative learning environment,” and calls for the teacher to be required to complete an “Unteach Racism” programme.
McClure said the complaint is politically motivated and an attempt to punish someone for holding an unpopular view.
“This teacher has a right, like anyone else, to express their opinions freely on social media,” she said. “The Teaching Council cannot use its Code of Conduct to silence people having a political opinion outside the classroom. That itself would be a potential breach of the law.”
She also said teachers had contacted her directly to say they felt the Council’s submission did not reflect their views or speak on their behalf.
The Free Speech Union, which is representing the teacher, has written to the Teaching Council’s Investigations Advisor urging it to dismiss the complaint.
In a letter signed by senior in-house counsel Hannah Clow, the Union said the complaint is part of a growing pattern where individuals target professionals subject to regulation simply for expressing unpopular views.
“There has been a concerning trend of individuals actively searching online for those who express views they disagree with… solely to lodge complaints against them,” the letter said. “Such actions are often vexatious and unrelated to genuine concerns about a person’s ability to perform their role.”
The Union said teachers do not lose their civil liberties upon entering the profession and argued that the Council has no authority to regulate personal political commentary made outside the classroom.
“She is entitled to express her views on education without fear of a Teaching Council investigation,” the Union said. “This principle is fundamental to the values of a liberal democracy.”
The Free Speech Union warned that if the complaint proceeds further, it will publicly advocate for the teacher’s right to free expression.
In response, the Teaching Council declined to comment to chrislynchmedia.com on the specific case, citing confidentiality, but said all complaints are carefully assessed in line with the law.
“In general, the Teaching Council cannot comment on specific matters as these are private and confidential to those involved,” it said. “However, we are required to always carefully consider every complaint and mandatory report we receive. The teacher or their representative is always given the opportunity to respond before the Triage Committee makes any decisions.”
The Council said not all complaints lead to formal investigations, with around 40 percent of matters resolved at the triage stage without further action.
It also defended its professional standards and its submission to Parliament, saying the Code of Professional Responsibility was developed in consultation with teachers and reflects the expectations of the profession.
“All teachers are entitled to hold personal beliefs and ideologies,” the Council said. “It is possible to be true to your own beliefs and be a teacher. However, it is essential they do not use their position of authority to enforce, impose, or promote their views onto students.”
The Council said its top priority remains the safety and wellbeing of learners in the classroom, supported by high-quality, professional teachers.
Broadcaster Chris Lynch is an award winning journalist who also produces Christchurch news and video content for domestic and international companies. This article was originally published by Chris Lynch Media and is published here with kind permission.
13 comments:
The Teacher's Council is so hypocritical. The teacher who was the subject of the complaint was not using her position of authority to impose her political opinions on her students. She was making a valid complaint that the Council was falsely claiming to represent all teachers when it made submissions on a bill before Parliament. In other words, using its position of authority to impose its political opinions on teachers. The Teacher's Council also uses its position of authority to impose its political opinions on students when it promotes the propaganda taught in schools that Maori are a superior race, that pre-colonial NZ was a paradise on earth, and it was all ruined by the evil pakeha who stole all the land.
How hypocritical the second last paragraph! It’s ok to ram all things Māori down pupils’ throats though.
Speaking out against the corporate apartheid agenda (reverse racism) is going to be dealt with using the governments “National Action Plan Against Racism” initiative, which is really an attack on our God given rights to free speech.
So, if you don’t agree with the false fake fraudulent English language “official version” of the treaty, or of the “attempt at a reconstruction of the literal translation of the Maori text” that is being used by our government against “equality” for all New Zealanders, then you are deemed a racist.
Much like antisemitism is being used to shut down free speech against the genocide of the “semitic” Palestinians.
Don't you just love New Zealand today.
We have the Teaching Council literally stating:
'All teachers are entitled to hold personal beliefs and ideologies' and at the very same time they are submitting to the select commitee in opposition to the TPB on behalf of all teachers.
There are 2 things very wrong with this. The Teaching Council should hold no political stance and should never submit upon anything unless it is lobbying FOR their teacher members.
The other is that they are acting in a bad faith way toward their members when they say one thing and do exactly the opposite.
Government needs to clean these people out pronto.
The council is theoretically imposing their own views on students by opposing the Treaty Principles Bill. One can assume students would have some knowledge of the Teachers Councils opposing submission. Therefore their stance is pretty hypocritical. Can they explain what is actually wrong with the TPB to the court if it gets that far? That's what most supporters of the bill can't fathom.
Right. Another potentially woke racist far left organisation.
They also appear to have a very firm grasp of the wrong end of the stick. It will not be them that decides the outcome here, it will be us, the good people of this country. Yes, they might get to sack this poor individual who has spoken up against their potentially woke racist agenda.
Chris, I think we need to put these guys on our radar, who are the people at the top....the woke racist enablers, if you please? I think a letter and emails initially to gauge how far left these people are and to stick up for the poor teacher, who is probably the only decent non racist, non woke human being out of the lot of them.
They will be held to account.
Names thanks.
This is George Orwell 1984, Big Brother. The teacher is being accused of "crimespeak"
This case shows how little there is nowadays between NZ and North Korea. Political stances are dictated to govt employees and they risk disciplinary action or dismissal if they disagree with those. This violates their basic human rights in that nobody can force someone to support a political doctrine that they disagree with. The Supreme Court of the UK, amongst others, has ruled on this. It's time NZ adopted the same position and distanced itself from what happens in Pyongyang.
I am highly amused by the 'unteach racism' programme the teacher is supposed to complete. There needs to be balance and a series of other 'unteach' programmes instituted for the morons who censured this teacher, such as 'unteach corrupt views of NZ history'; 'unteach lies about biological differences between the sexes'; 'unteach this propensity to make sociological change' and actually just get on with teaching. No wonder NZ educational standards are abysmal.
That was Doug Longmire, not "anonymous"
It is a long time ago now that teachers 'just got on with teaching' , as we traditionally knew it, Allen, since the foundations of our present education 's ideology are based on indoctrination into socialism and knocking out traditional values including true liberalism. True education was never their aim.
The seeds of 'Animal; Farm ' and '1984' were sown in our education very many decades ago under PM Peter Fraser .The first action taken was to put education decisions largely into the hands of academia , known for being pro Progressive /Marxist . This resulted in firstly the introduction of teaching methods that were /are ineffective followed every so insidiously by indoctrination into Marxism.
If we desire real teaching to occur in our schools a whole truckload of ideological crap needs removing not just the 'Teachers' Union' who are just the tip of the iceberg.
Unteach racism!!!! Seriously??? Is this for real??? How the h did we let it get to this? My response to that would be brought to you by the letters G and F. We need more teachers like this not less.
It is beyond time that members of these "Councils" (such as Teachers, Pharmacy. Nurses et al) were elected on a 3 year basis by their members instead of the political appointments they are at present. This would prevent the situation they have today, with Councils operating by their own rules
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