‘Major trade-offs' allow for learning support boost

Newsroom

22-05-2025

Erica Stanford has delivered a $2.5 billion education Budget, with $646 million for learning support offset by $614m in cuts to 'underperforming' programmes.
Experts and educators say the investment in a sector crying out for help is welcomed, but question whether it's truly transformational – and at what cost.
Stanford is describing this as the 'most significant investment in learning support in a generation', but those in the sector note that it's only been possible because of significant reprioritisation and pay equity changes expected to hit those in the education workforce.
It comes the same week as a new report painted a picture of a system at breaking point, with almost every educator describing the situation in classrooms as dire. One principal even said they feared a child would die on their watch because of the lack of supervision for children with additional and complex needs.
Between 15 percent and 20 percent of people are neurodivergent, but only 6-7 percent of students receive publicly funded learning support, with Māori, Pasifika, English second-language speakers and those attending rural and high equity index schools most affected by the underfunding and fragmented system.
Decades of reviews have left successive governments with no doubt as to the problems plaguing the under-resourced system which is supposed to provide timely, appropriate support to neurodivergent children, or those with disabilities, health needs or trauma. And under-resourcing, paired with a critical workforce shortage, mean schools often name complex and behavioural needs as the number one challenge they face.
The learning support budget included $266m to extend the early intervention service through to the end of Year 1, which was expected to fund more than 560 additional full-time equivalent early intervention teachers and specialists. This should allow for 4000 children with additional needs to receive support for their transition to primary school.
That funding would also cover an additional 900,000 teacher aide hours a year, phasing in from 2028 – an admission of the workforce shortage.
But Stanford said she was confident they would find the teachers needed from the now cut Kāhui Ako programme, which would release about 600 teachers into the workforce.
There was also $122m to meet increased demand for the Ongoing Resourcing Scheme, for students with high and complex needs. This funding was geared towards getting such support to an additional 1700 learners over the next four years.
The money also included a commitment to get learning support coordinators into every primary school in the country, with an additional 300,000 students benefiting from this uplift.
There was also extra in the Budget for speech and language therapists, targeted professional development for teacher aides, additional educational psychologists and learning support satellite classrooms and necessary changes to school buildings.
'The key message for parents today is we've got your back, not only if your children need help in maths or literacy, but also if they have additional learning needs. This is the largest investment into learning support in a generation, and it will be transformational,' Stanford said.
Meanwhile, Nicola Willis told Newsroom she and Stanford were 'in cahoots' on this one.
Willis had personal experience with additional learning needs, and said early intervention and guaranteed support for children who needed it would make a significant difference.
She had seen situations where children had struggled to get a diagnosis or hadn't received the support they needed and it affected that child, the school and, in some cases, it had torn families apart.
Willis said the early intervention services were a no-brainer in terms of her focus on social investment. Getting support to children and students as soon as possible would help them fulfil their potential.
Dr Sarah Aiono, author of the recent Beyond Capacity report and a former complex needs specialist teacher, told Newsroom there were encouraging aspects of the learning support investments that showed the minister had heard 'the sector's consistent calls for better support'.
Though the roadmap outlined a long-term, staged expansion of services, the sector's need was urgent and immediate. Meanwhile, a report released by NZEI Te Riu Roa union last month estimated $2.5b was needed for learning support in the next five years.
Moreover, these 'promising steps' fell short of a 'true reset', she said.
It was also important to temper the language that this was 'transformational' or 'the single largest investment in a generation', she said.
Much of the funding in this package had been reprioritised, not newly allocated – meaning some roles in the sector would be lost.
Within the savings section of the Budget was $614m of cuts and reprioritisations. There were 22 initiatives listed in the savings section, including under-spending on charter schools and the Kāhui Ako programme.
Among the cut programmes was $13m from resource teachers for learning and behaviour for Years 11-13. In its documents, Treasury noted there had been no evaluation of the effectiveness of the scheme and there was 'minimal assurances' on what it is used for. 'The funding will be reinvested in learning support to deliver targeted multi-tiered, in-school learning support for students with additional needs.'
Aiono and the NZEI teachers' union noted the uplift also came along with the changes to pay equity, which directly affected learning support staff and other educators.
'These are significant trade-offs that should not be glossed over,' Aiono said.
This week's big spend on education marked one of the Government's top priority areas, but it was somewhat overshadowed by the Government's pay equity changes and leaks.
Late Budget eve, the Government was granted an urgent injunction to stop RNZ publishing a Budget-sensitive document, which the Attorney-General's office said contained 'commercially sensitive information that would prejudice the Government's ability to engage effectively in collective bargaining'.
Teachers are in negotiations about pay increases, with the Public Service Commissioner taking the reins on collective bargaining in May.
Ahead of Thursday, Finance Minister Nicola Willis confirmed the Budget would have money set aside for the teacher pay settlement. But these figures were not revealed as they could be seen to undermine the Government's ability to negotiate with the unions.
The bargaining – as well as at least four leaks of Budget-sensitive education material in the lead-up to Thursday – were taking place against a backdrop of strikes and protests from teachers, union leaders and Ministry of Education staff over pay.
Teaching is one of the sectors affected by the Government's pay equity changes, with a claim covering 95,000 early childhood, primary and secondary teachers being wiped as part of the overhaul.
Unions expect secondary teachers would be particularly disadvantaged by the changes to the thresholds in the new Equal Pay Act, as the workforce had to prove it was at least 70 percent female (a shift from the earlier 60 percent threshold). Though early childhood and primary teachers easily met this bar, secondary teachers didn't.
At the same time, union pay equity experts said they thought the new changes could make bringing a future claim 'virtually impossible' because of the new rules governing the use of comparators as well as the need to prove a claim's merit at the outset (rather than 'arguability').