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.

Let me tell you something - school is compulsory in New Zealand. If it's compulsory and you don't do it, you will get punished. A fine is the punishment, that's how compulsion works.

There's no point in having it be compulsory if you aren't prepared to punish someone for the compulsory thing not happening.

And the fine thing is not new, they already exist on the books.

Parents can be fined up to $3000 if they’re recidivist offenders, it's just that the fine is not enforced.

The second thing he’s doing is scrapping teacher-only days during term times. Schools now have to hold teacher-only days in term breaks.

100 percent the teacher unions will complain about this, but again - this is not new.

According to David Seymour's office, the law already states that teacher-only days should only be held during school breaks. And if they have to be held during term time, it must be only with the permission of the Ministry of Education - but it’s got a bit loose.

So, all David Seymour is doing here is reminding us all what the existing rules already are and getting us to follow them.

And the fact that that is quite a big crack down - I think that tells you how loose we’ve gotten with respecting education.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Good father do to see Ellen all. That's quite the
crackdown on the truancye from David Seymour, isn't it. Jeez.
Don't expect this to go down with the go down
well with the teacher unions. So the first thing that
David Seamols announced is that he's coming for the parents.
He's going to bring in the possibility of enforcing fines
on parents who don't send their kids to school. Now
one hundred percent the excuse makers in this country are

(00:23):
going to have a problem with this because it's picking
on the vulnerable, et cetera, et cetera. Let me tell
you something. School is compulsory in New Zealand. If it's
compulsory and you don't do it, generally, how that works
is you get punished. A fine is your punishment. That's
how compulsion works, right, There's no point in having it
be compulsory and ask go, well it's compulsory. If we're
not well, then prepared to also punish someone for not

(00:46):
doing the compulsory thing. And the fine is not new.
But it's not like David Seymore's dreamed up a fine here.
These fines are already on the books. They already exist. Parents
can already be fined thirty bucks a day if they
don't send their kids to school, potentially up to three
thousand bucks. They are recidivis defenders. It's just that currently,
for the longest time, the finds have not been enforced. Now,

(01:06):
the second thing that David Seymour is doing is that
he's scrapping teacher only days during term times. Schools at
the moment have to have to hold the teacher under
these new rules, not even new rules. Under this direction,
schools will have to hold the teacher only days in
term breaks now one hundred percent the school. The teacher
unions are going to complain about this, but again again

(01:28):
this is not new. According to David Seymour's office. The
law already says that teacher only days should only be
held during breaks right, not during term time. And if
they have to be held during term time, they can
only be held with the permission of the Ministry of Education.
But things have just got a bit ropy here, haven't they.
So all David Seymour is doing here is reminding us

(01:48):
all what the rules already are and trying to get
us to follow the existing rules. And the fact that
this is coming across as quite a big crackdown I
think tells you how loose we've up with respecting education.
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