Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 28/1/25

Simeon Brown steps out as Minister of Health

Your PoO monitors of ministerial doings have noted that, since we last reported, Simeon Brown has stepped out to deliver his first media statement as Minister of Health.

The PM and his refreshed Cabinet team have been …

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 30/10/24

Podiatrists to get a firmer toehold on healing patients while builders will check the quality of their own handiwork

The Government’s deregulatory impulse is evident in the latest posts on the government’s official website.

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 27/9/24

Thanks, Minister – but our wellbeing would be greatly improved if we knew the cost of this mental health initiative

Small Business and Manufacturing Minister Andrew Bayly is among the ministers who contributed to a flood of announcements and speeches to the government’s official website in the past 24 hours.

But we suspect something is missing from his enthusing about the Government and Auckland Business Chamber entering a memorandum of understanding

Perspective with Heather du Plessis-Allan: Don't expect David Seymour's crackdown to go over well with teacher unions

That's quite the crackdown on truancy from David Seymour today - don't expect this to go down well with the teacher unions.

So the first thing David Seymour's announced is that he's coming for the parents. He's bringing in the possibility of enforcing fines on parents who don't send their kids to school.

Now, it's 100 percent that the excuse-makers of this country are gonna have a problem with this because it’s picking on the vulnerable, etc.

Heather du Plessis-Allan: Why is it that we have this truancy problem?

As you know, truancy has been a topic of some discussion in the last week, especially with Associate Education Minster David Seymour's plans to get kids back into class.

I've been puzzling over it, especially since it popped up last week, over why it is that we have this truancy problem and why we have parents on both ends of the parenting spectrum who are as casual as they are about school.

Why have we got what I would consider to be delinquent parents, who just don't care if the kid goes to school?

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 9/4/24

The PM sets nine policy targets- and in case you missed the truancy one, Seymour has provided some details

Targets and travel were a theme in the latest flow of ministerial announcements.

The PM announced a raft of targets (“nine ambitious Government Targets to help improve the lives of New Zealanders”) along with plans to head for Singapore, Thailand, and Philippines.

Heather du Plessis-Allan: Those striking for the climate should be marked truant

My disagreement with David Seymour on truancy has been short-lived this week - because I could not agree more with him today. 

Those kids out bunking school today so they can strike for the climate should be marked down as truant: Explained but unjustified absence. 

I think I'm less tolerant of it today than I was when these shenanigans first started up because at least the ones who were striking back in 2019 when their messiah Greta Thunberg was leading them seemed to be genuinely motivated by the delusion that the opinion of children counted. 

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 5/4/24

NCEA and truancy issues are high on the agenda for education ministers while progress is made in replacing Three Waters

The Minister of Education today advised us the Government is to “rephase” the NCEA Change Programme.

The coalition Government is making “significant changes” to the NCEA Change Programme and will delay its implementation by two years.

Heather du Plessis-Allan: I disagree with sending sick kids into school

I'm mostly with David Seymour in that we need to get kids back into class, I'm with him in that we need to slash truancy rates- and there needs to be a very good reason for kids to miss school.

I would even go so far as to say this is right up there in top 5 things that need to be sorted in this country.

But where we part company is on his call to get kids back into class even if they’re sick.

Heather du Plessis-Allan: We're way too chill about kids missing class

Let me tell you something that happened today.

This morning, David Seymour was on the radio with Mike Hosking, outlining his plans to tackle truancy in this country by enforcing the rules so that parents cop fines if they don’t send their kids to school.

Only about 2.5 hours later, over on ZM, a mum entered a competition to get herself and her daughter to the Taylor Swift show in Melbourne tomorrow.

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 20/12/23

Treasury’s fiscal update shows eliminating budget deficits will be hard work, but Willis stays wedded to tax relief promise

Four fiscally focused press statements flowed from the office if the Minister of Finance this morning as Nicola Willis released her government’s “mini-Budget” alongside the Treasury’s Half Year Economic and Fiscal Update (HYEFU).

The aim – obviously – was to persuade us the government’s financial management is in better hands than it was before the election and Willis will be doing her darndest to pave the way to cut taxes.

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 5/9/23

Govt could do better at rounding up truants – and at ensuring all students have something to show for their schooling

The country’s hard-working ministers – and their not-so-hard-working colleagues – perhaps are out on the campaign trail, doing their bit to secure the government’s re-election. That would explain the absence of new announcements, pronouncements or pontifications when Point of Order checked the government’s official website for news early this morning.

What to do?

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 22/8/23

Govt is dishing out free meds and free mental health services – and it looks like truants’ parents can stay free of prosecution

The word “free” has been dubiously bandied by Health Minister Ayesha Verrall in two of her three press statements over the past 24 hours or so.

She has been enthusing about

Michael Johnston: A 'third way' approach to truancy

New Zealand’s much-publicised truancy problem is not easy to get a handle on. Should we go for the carrot or the stick?

On the ‘carrot’ side of the ledger, some American commentators have suggested paying students to turn up to school. But here in New Zealand, the government has opted for the ‘stick’ approach, announcing $74M to pay for new attendance officers. ACT wants to use a bigger stick and issue on-the-spot fines to the parents of truant students.

But some of our innovative secondary schools have devised a clever, ‘third way’, approach to the problem. Their solution is to change the definition of school attendance.

Point of Order: Education in crisis, in part because of falling attendances......

......it’s a problem NZ does not have on its own

Education is in crisis in New Zealand — that has become a headline which will be all too familiar to readers of Point of Order. This week, Newshub’s AM show featured it with the catchline on how attendance rates in schools had fallen from 66.1% in term 4 of 2019 to just 50.6% in term 4 of 2022.

Economist Cameron Bagrie told AM’s Ryan Bridge he is “horrified” by the figures and they will have significant real-world consequences in a few decades.

Alwyn Poole: The Truth about NZ Truancy

The NZ Herald notes that Term 3 NZ School attendance data has finally been released. It also notes that Jan Tinetti admitted deliberately sitting on it (and thus avoiding numerous OIA’s – I assume she blames the previous Minister) since December. They have become so transparent that people now see right through them.

From the Ministry of Education’s data branch (who are very good BTW) this graph is telling.

Mike Hosking: Not all truancy situations are created equal

Is there a clue to attendance and schooling in the enjoyment you derive as a student?

We got the letter from the school yesterday about them clamping down on turning up.

You need notes and good reasons, which you have always officially needed, but it’s got lax over the years, as rules do. But they have clearly got the word from the Ministry so the emails get sent out.

Heather du Plessis-Allan: Truancy announcement is just vote buying

Look, I really want to believe that 82 new truancy officers are going to turn around our falling attendance rates at schools. 

But we live in the real world, so here are some real world facts:

We have 2500 schools and 815,000 students in this country.

That means each of those officers is going to have to cover 31 schools each. Each of those officers is responsible for 10,000 students each.

If the figures are to be believed and 54 percent were truant in term three last year, then each of those officers are supposed to chase up 5400 students regularly.

Point of Order: Govt pumps $74m into truancy package....

......but will Tinetti be a dunce, or will she prosecute parents and earn top marks

Two cyclone-related announcements were found on the Beehive website this morning. But a ministerial announcement that triggered a tart response from ACT – about truancy – had not yet been posted, although it was the subject of a front-page headline in the Dominion-Post today.

The headline was $74m package to fight truancy.

Mike Hosking: Truancy has been an issue for years, not just in an election year

Eagle-eared listeners might have picked up yesterday the non-answer from Chris Hipkins over truancy.

Yes, an announcement is coming this week, maybe even today, and it’s the return of the truancy officer. Not that we want to call them that, they'll be called something woke.

But what he wouldn’t answer was the very simple question - why now?