Unforeseen consequences

The decision in Budget 2012 to rebalance teacher ratios has had unforeseen consequences; Stuff reports:

Education funding reforms go too far for some intermediate schools, Prime Minister John Key admits.

Changes announced in last week's Budget will see teacher numbers capped over the next four years. The cap is achieved by a series of changes to funding formulas, which rebalance the spread of about 52,500 teachers across the nation's schools.

It is likely some teachers will be laid off as a result of the changes as some schools are forced to meet new, lower budgets.

While the overall number of teachers will not change much, new teachers will likely be competing with more candidates for fewer new positions.

Mr Key admitted there were a few schools where "a significant number of teachers" would have to leave under the proposed changes.

"That would be too many for the Government, so we'll have to work on that," Mr Key said.

"For the overwhelming bulk of schools, we're comfortable – change is very modest. For some, it's more extreme, it's at the harder end and I think we need to look at addressing that harder end." 

Critics of the proposed reform were quick to point out anomalies in the Government's plan. And to their credit, John Key and Hekia Parata acknowledge this, and will be having a re-think.

No government gets everything right. In an ideal world, the full effect of funding changes would have been thoroughly worked through, so that anomalies could be eliminated. 

Clearly, that has not been the case here, and the Government gets a fail mark because of it. Let's hope that their second attempt is more successful, and that "unforeseen consequences" are actually predicted through thorough analysis of the proposals and their downstream effects. In the meantime, their report card reads "Must try harder".