KEY POINTS:
Both Labour and National fired off a volley of policy shots this week on education, starkly revealing the difference between the two parties.
To achieve his goals John Key favours the carrot approach, Helen Clark prefers to wield a stick.
Distressed to find, much to her surprise after three terms in office, that 40 per cent of New Zealand kids leave secondary school with no real qualifications Clark has decided to force them to learn.
This overlooks the fact that it is entirely possible that 40 per cent of the country is as thick as two short planks or just bone idle and, no matter what you do, they will never become well skilled, highly motivated worker ants in our modern, 21st-century global economy.
I think many of that 40 per cent of school leavers actually do have some qualifications, it's just that NCEA results are so bloody confusing they don't understand they have actually passed several subjects.
Whatever, Clark is determined to round up those strays and whip them back into the herd by raising the school-leaving age to 18 and compelling them to stay at school.
I'm not sure Helen knows much about teenagers but, in my experience, it is impossible to compel a 16- or 17-year-old to do anything. When confronted with authority and ordered to do anything they invariably respond with what the Army once defined as "dumb insolence".
Having learned nothing or showed no aptitude for learning by the age of 16, what on Earth makes Labour think that these kids will suddenly kick-start themselves into becoming Rhodes Scholars by age 18?
Should the Government's plan come into effect, I fully expect in another nine years to see a statistic that says 40 per cent of 18-year-olds are leaving school with no qualifications.
Meanwhile, Key waves National's Youth Guarantee as a carrot, promising 16- and 17-year-olds free access to some form of skill training if they have left school. If they don't pick up that kind offer they cannot get a benefit, a threat that is more a twig than a stick. Presumably, if they cannot get a benefit they will simply continue to bludge off their parents or add to the rising youth crime statistics and go thieving.
Both Clark and Key are determined to thrust as many reluctant spotty youths as they can into apprenticeships and other skilled occupations. This should mean in a decade's time New Zealand will have a huge labour reservoir of bad, bored, and brooding semi-skilled young tradespeople, most of whom will prefer to be surfing or crumping in some club rather than fixing your car or repairing your household appliances.
When he moved on to tertiary education Key again displayed his presumption that people respond well to incentives - even if they are physically incapable of performing the task required.
Wiping the interest off student loan debt while at university was a sane political move for National, if it wants a single student vote at the next election. Its next step of offering a 10 per cent "bonus" to students who pay lump sums off their debt earlier than required demonstrates how out of touch National is. Money market dealers respond to bonuses; postgraduate students struggling to survive in new jobs do not.
According to the New Zealand University Students Association the average student debt is more than $28,000 and the salary for a graduate five years into the workforce is just over $33,000.
Subtract from that wage, 33 per cent taxation, the chunk for KiwiSaver, rent, and living expenses, and there is little or nothing left for Key's lump-sum payoffs, let alone the standard student debt repayments. I guess a couple of highly paid law graduates might thank him.
For as much as both parties whinge about housing affordability for young people, is it any wonder young couples cannot afford to save to buy a home when the State saddles them with huge tertiary debts then hamstrings them by gouging their pay cheques for repayments?
Gee, ever wonder why one million Kiwis prefer to live and work abroad? Ever wonder why our most skilled and qualified young people are fleeing overseas? Their debt goes on hold and they have the chance to earn enough to one day maybe pay it off.
The student loan scheme is a disastrous failure, condemning the young to a hopeless poverty trap. Get rid of it, wipe out the debt and more heavily subsidise tertiary education so that it is virtually free. Forget the cost. This approach will pay off handsomely in the long term. It is a real carrot that will get people learning. It might even be an election winner.
