Only four schools use Huata's reading plan

The early childhood reading programme which Donna Awatere Huata helped develop should perhaps be named after a more endangered shellfish than the pipi.

At one time the Pipi Foundation's programme was regarded as a trailblazing early reading system. With Awatere Huata as its champion, the four-minute reading programme in English and Maori secured Government funding - around $840,000 over three years - and great kudos.

However, after the financial management of the trust came under the scrutiny of the Serious Fraud Office, Pipi's fortunes were blighted. Awatere Huata, at the time an Act MP, was accused and later convicted, of fraud, as was her husband Wi Huata - charges the couple appealed against this week.

The foundation was left scarred by Awatere Huata's conviction, lost its contract with the Ministry of Education and faced escalating debt with the Inland Revenue Department. Awatere Huata's gifting of the reading programme to the Pipi Foundation also turned out to be something of a Trojan Horse; now just four schools use the programme, free of charge.

"Those schools have continued to use it from when they first had access to the programme [when it was fully subsidised], and we've been okay with that," said trust chairman Des Ratima.

But the foundation - which at present has no income - remains inert, and its future rests on the mana of the Pipi programme being restored. Mr Ratima believes the strength of the programme will enable the trust to survive.

"We're considering a commercial component to future programmes we put out, and that could be a licensing fee or something like that. Our lawyers are looking at those options at the moment.

"The foundation has been in limbo in terms of being active and pursuing new clients, but there's been work for the trustees in addressing issues, mainly the IRD debt. That's been the focus for the last 12 months since I've been chairman. And mainly ensuring there's a wash-up from what's happened in the past."

He said eight schools were interested in picking up the Pipi method.

Mr Ratima dismissed two reports commissioned by the Ministry of Education in 2001 and 2002 that questioned the programme's effectiveness. The reports suggested the English programme had some benefits and the Maori programme was less effective, but conceded that the size of the sample (37 pupils from two schools and six children from a pre-school) was too small to be conclusive.

The ministry had planned to carry out further research, but that was tossed in 2002 when the Pipi contract was cancelled.

As a sideline to the Court of Appeal hearing this week, an affidavit written by the trust emerged, in which it was revealed that it had offered Awatere Huata a $60,000 payment for the Pipi programme.

Awatere Huata turned down the money, saying she had never started Pipi for monetary gain.

Despite the unfortunate timing, Mr Ratima said the offer - less than the foundation's IRD debt - had to be made to close one chapter of the Pipi story and open another.

"What's just happened has fixed up things from the past. We now have a clean slate and we can take some leadership as trustees."