Professor John Raine: Concerned Citizens, Not Haters and Liars

Public voices have been loud and but not entirely clear over particular sections in the Education and Training Act Amendment Bill (No.2). Apart from submissions to the Select Committee, Minister of Education, Erica Stanford, has received many personal messages.

The pressure on our Cabinet Ministers is understandable, but on Mike Hosking Breakfast 27th June, Erica Stanford referred to those who had sent her emails as, “whipped up with hatred, frothing at the mouth and spouting complete and utter garbage, lies” - extreme words that fell back on lazy social media slurs. Misinformed or intemperate remarks would have been a small proportion of the messages sent to the Minister. The large majority would have been stating real concerns that the Bill as it stands appears to leave the door open for undue Treaty dominance and continued decolonisation activism in our education system.

Graham Adams: Stanford’s sly Treaty move backfires

National on back foot over Education bill.

Among the welter of commentary surrounding the recent publication of Jacinda Ardern’s memoir, it was very noticeable that journalists avoided mentioning co-governance and race-based policy as a significant factor in her political demise. It’s a topic they mostly prefer to skirt if they can.

This is perhaps not surprising given she paid legacy media companies $55 million to promote co-governance by insisting the Treaty be treated as a “partnership” as a condition for receiving taxpayer money.

Heather du Plessis-Allan: Education and Training Amendment Bill No 2

Heather du Plessis-Allan chats on NewstalkZB about the Treaty of Waitangi and Maori preference clauses in the Education and Training Amendment Bill No2 that Erica Stanford of the National Party has tried to sneak through.

Click to view

Matua Kahurangi: ACT tries to end race-based education

National folds to the woke

The other day I wrote about how Erica Stanford has been quietly ushering race-based policy back into New Zealand schools, under the feel-good label of “pastoral care”. Now we learn that while Stanford is pushing things in one direction, the ACT Party has been trying to steer us in another. You can read my original article here:

Matua Kahurangi: Erica Stanford sneaks race-based policy back into schools

Just when you thought National put an end to race-based policies and co-governance in public services, Erica Stanford’s new Education and Training Amendment Bill (No 2) makes you wonder if National has completely lost sight of those promises. It reads more like something from the Labour government than the party Kiwis voted in to restore some common sense.

The bill would require school boards to give effect to Te Tiriti o Waitangi by:

Elizabeth Rata: Letter to the Minister of Education

Sent 22nd June 2025

Hon Erica Stanford
Minister of Education
Parliament Buildings
Wellington

Dear Ms Stanford

I write to ask if you would re-consider the inclusion of Section 9 and Section 127 in the Education and Training Amendment Bill (No 2) 2025 on the basis that they are not relevant to the regulation of the education system. (See the Coalition Agreement’s statement about Treaty relevance.)

John Robertson: You’re Not a Racist — You’re Just Done With Religion Disguised as Culture

Education and Training Amendment Bill (No 2)

New Zealand was meant to be a secular democracy. Instead, we’ve got a government pushing a bill that wraps spiritual beliefs in “culture” and slips them into our schools.

This isn’t about honouring heritage — it’s about normalising prayers to gods in taxpayer-funded classrooms, without ever calling it religion. Because religion gets criticised — but culture? Culture is sacred. Mandatory. Untouchable.