Mana | Movement of the People

MANA in Parliament, 28-30 May 2013

Government responds to Feed the Kids campaign
This week the government announced that it would spend $2m per year on expanding Fonterra and Sanitarium’s KickStart breakfast programme from 2 days a week to 5 days in participating schools. The announcement responds to both the recommendation of the Children’s Commissioner’s Expert Advisory Group who have called for a comprehensive, nationalised food programme in low-decile schools – and the huge public interest in and support for food in schools that’s been generated by MANA’s Feed the Kids Bill. While there were some hopes that the government would do something decent here, especially in light of John Key’s previous support for food in schools, the next-to-nothing announcement was a big disappointment for all involved in the issue – and particularly the kids themselves who in surveys have listed hunger as their number one priority issue. See the MANA website, www.mana.org.nz, for Hone’s media release where he says that our kids deserve proper, on-going government support not the crumbs of corporate charity, which comes and goes depending on their bottom line. In the Ikaroa Rāwhiti electorate alone, there are 33,000 children in low-decile schools, and according to the KickStart website only 3,000 of them are part of the initiative and will benefit from the extra funding. That’s not even 10%. And it will be much the same elsewhere. Under the Feed the Kids Bill, all low-decile schools would be included and all children would get breakfast – and lunch. The Bill will go up for first reading in July and we’re doing all we can to get it over the line. It was great to see that a recent nationwide poll had 70% of New Zealanders in support of government funded food programmes in schools.

Government Bills
The other big issue in Parliament this week was the committee stage of the Education Amendment Bill which will see charter schools introduced into New Zealand. A large number of amendments were tabled to try to take the worst edges off the Bill – including the requirement for charter schools to have registered teachers, to follow the curriculum, that would require them to have proper financial accountability and transparency, and that would prevent them from being run as a profit-making business. All of the amendments were voted down by National, ACT and the Māori Party. It will go before Parliament for its third and final reading next week.

Te Hāmua Nikora and the Ikaroa Rāwhiti By-Election
Following last week’s announcement of Te Hāmua Nikora as MANA’s candidate in the by-election, he’s jumped into the spotlight and is already acting like a seasoned MP. See the MANA website for Te Hāmua’s press releases, including what he had to say to the Race Relations Commissioner and the PM about their lame response to the racist cartoon in the Marlborough Express this week. His comment to the PM that “racism is not subjective if you are the subject of racism” made international news. Way to go Bro.