A few weeks back I revealed how the government’s new public:private partnership school in Auckland is actually costing more than it would’ve cost if it had been built using the traditional approach. Since then I’ve been asking a few more questions. Here are a couple of recent answers:
Question: What is the total annual budget for the Ministry of Education to oversee government use of Public Private Partnerships within the education sector, in each of the next 3 years?
Answer: The Ministry of Education has appropriated a budget of $100,000 per year for the next three years.
Question: What is the full list of Ministry of Education staff positions that oversee government use of Public Private Partnerships within the education sector?
Answer: The team for the Hobsonville Point Schools’ Public Private Partnership (PPP) includes a Project Director, Policy Analyst and Project Co-ordinator.
Question: How many people working for the Ministry of Education to oversee government use of Public Private Partnerships within the education sector have been redeployed from other areas and how many are new recruits?
Answer: I am advised that that there is one new recruit. No one has been redeployed from other areas.
Now either the Ministry has found an ingenious way to hire 3 staff for less than $100,000 per year all up, or something isn’t quite right here. It’s also not clear how they can have put together a team of 3 people by only recruiting one person and not redeploying anyone else. Perhaps these are some of John Key’s ghost jobs?
I asked for a bit more information. The answer to one of my follow-up questions came through today:
Question: Further to his answer to written question 06416 (2012) Does the $100,000 budget for the Hobsonville Private Public Partnership project cover the full salaries of the 3 staff working in the team?
Answer: The question cannot be answered in the timeframe and I will resolve to answer as soon as practicable.
Really? It’s a pretty simple question. I suspect the answer is going to be no, given 3 project management staff are likely to have salary packages that collectively add up to significantly more than $100,000 per year. How on earth can he justify taking more than 5 working days to come up with an answer to this one? Certainly doesn’t inspire confidence that the taxpayer is getting value for their money from this lot!
Maybe if you had spent more time in a real job before becoming an MP then the solution might present itself to you very easily Chris. I will let you into a little secret. NOT ALL JOBS ARE FULL TIME!
It is perfectly possible that a project director, policy analyst and project coordinator only spend 10% of their time on the project. Why is this so shocking to you?
But allowing part time gets in the way of a good story!
Best go back and draft another question to get deeper Mr Hipkins.
You would think Chris might have learned that he’s not very effective at these Gotchas. Just a couple of weeks ago he was all up in arms because he thought Hekia Parata’s office was digging deep into the files of the Ministry of Education to work out where teachers who wrote to her office worked. The answer: The teachers emailed her using their school email addresses!
whodunnit, actually I worked doing project management before getting into politics, in the private sector even, and it would be unheard of where I was working for a project not to factor in an estimate of the staff time dedicated to it.
If 10% of a staff members time is being devoted to this project, then that’s 10% of their time not being spent on something else, so that cost has to be factored in.
The answer to my follow-up question could well be that the $100k budget only covers part of the staff time for the 3 people working on it, in which case after 5 days to think about it, I can’t see why the Minister was unable to answer. Unless of course he has no idea how he is spending taxpayers money…
Chris, maybe you should have done more work preparing concise questions to gather the facts rather than being determined to make an issue out of how $100k of government expenditure is allocated. Something like: “How many staff hours, and at what rates, are expected to be spent on X over the next three years?”
That would at least arm you with the information to make insightful commentary. You are in a unique position as a Member of Parliament to be able to question Ministers and get timely responses. It’s unfortunate you’re more interested in scoring cheap political points than actually gathering useful information.
The questions above are a selection of the answers (or lack thereof) received. I have indeed asked a series of very precise questions on these very issues. I’m surprised the government haven’t been able to answer.
Whodonut has put his foot in his mouth , as he ignores the information that Chippie has found, ie the PP School is going to cost MORE than it had been a purely government school. This is they way to find out, and $100,000 per year . A primary school would love that sort of money each year for funding stuff for kids learning.
Spud… Is that blood money, extracted from our state schools. If you cannot seem to starve them , drain `em?
It is hard not to be cynical about NACT and their real attidude to our generally excellent public education. When we have is a secret agreement between Key and Banks(not revealed pre election) we should be very worried?
Hang on. Everyone knows socialists have never had real jobs and are just unemployable teachers – right? (sarcasm)
Good on you Chris.
One of my relations was once Headmaster of Auckland Grammar School, the school is based on discipline, good quality teaching and a balanced approach to life, so it’s pupils can face the world with confidence once they leave, prity simple recipe really.
Anything John Cupcake Banks has to do with, will end up in a mess.
I don’t know what his academic background is but I don’t think he has too many academic qualifications.
Good luck hope it works.
And academics make the best of everything right…?
@Paul B – Yep and a few other places!
!!!!