Newsletter
Why every person on the former Teaching Council needs to hang their head in shame
Welcome
Two big stories this week:
Our new poll shows just how strongly parents back the mandatory hour a day of reading, writing and maths. It was great to see the Chair of the Secondary Principals’ Council also back the mandatory hour a day. Let’s hope Labour listens to parents and secondary principals and changes its stance.
A King's Counsel report laid out, in painful detail, how the Teaching Council let a man with indecency convictions keep teaching for more than a decade. Tragically he went on to abuse at least nine young girls while teaching. Please read on – we have a lot to say, and it's important.
Education is becoming a bigger election issue. We've included a round up of our (many) press releases since last Friday and a reminder about our Parents' Guide on structured literacy.
Could it be what tips the vote?
Apologies for the length. It was a big week.
Kiwis back the hour a day, five to one
Days after Chris Hipkins said Labour would scrap the requirement for primary and intermediate schools to teach at least an hour a day each of reading, writing and maths, we asked New Zealanders what they think.
The answer was emphatic. Our Curia Market Research poll found 74 percent support the requirement and just 15 percent oppose it, almost five to one. Support holds in every age group, region, ethnic group and income bracket, and Labour’s own voters back it by nearly three to one.
New Zealanders are united: every child should be guaranteed the basics.
The requirement for an hour a day of reading, writing and maths isn't radical. It's the bare minimum parents expect. With too many children leaving primary school behind in the basics, this is not the time to take the focus off them. As Audrey Young said, if the argument is teachers are already doing it, what is the harm in keeping it?
We'll keep making that case to every party between now and election day.
The Fisher report shows why the Teaching Council had to change. Here's what the changes mean for your kids.
Brace yourself.
Katherine Anderson KC's review of the Timothy Fisher case was released on 13 October. Fisher had indecency convictions. Police warned the Teaching Council in 2014 that he shouldn't be alone with children. He told the Council about his convictions himself in 2015. He was teaching illegally without a certificate. The Council's response was a $50 late fee, a file note saying “park it”, no legal advice, no investigation, and in 2017 the highest practising certificate a teacher can hold.
In 2023 and 2024 he sexually abused nine young girls at a tutoring centre that hired him because he was registered.
Katherine Anderson KC found the law was not the problem. Once Fisher was in, the Council had every power it needed and never once considered using them until he was in prison. When shown the KC's criticisms, the Council didn't dispute a single one.
Let's be plain. This abuse was preventable.
Whose job was it: the schools or the Teaching Council?
Parents might reasonably ask why the schools didn't catch this.
Under the law, the Teaching Council is the gatekeeper. It alone decides who is registered and certified, it alone receives the police vet, and schools are not allowed to see what is in it. A school can only check the public register, which showed Fisher as registered and fully certified right up until he was in prison. Schools are not allowed to employ a teacher without a current certificate, but the Council never told the schools involved that Fisher didn't have one.
The schools, in fact, kept raising the alarm. In 2014 his principal wrote to the Council saying he had not met the requirements for full registration. The Council never asked why. In 2015 his new principal found out about the police warning, suspended him within two days because he had no certificate, and filed a mandatory report. The Council's committee took no action. In 2017 his next school interviewed the students, reported him, and he resigned; the Council took four and a half years to publish the outcome. In 2019 the tutoring centre where he went on to offend hired him because the Council's own register said he was safe to employ.
That is why the fix is at the Council. Principals did what the system asked of them. The regulator that held all the information, and all the powers, did not.
What Cabinet decided, and why
The Cabinet papers are public, and they are blunt. In December 2024, the Minister told Cabinet she had initially wanted to strip the Council of its standard-setting role entirely, paused that, and instead issued the first Statement of Government Policy ever given to the Council, reserving the power to audit it if things didn't improve.
By June 2025 she'd concluded that wasn't enough. Her paper to Cabinet said the Council's broad mandate to “raise the status of the profession” diluted its focus on regulating teachers, and that its governance was not fit for purpose.
A footnote pointed out the Teaching Council's own 2024–2029 strategic plan barely mentioned certification, discipline, compliance or teacher-education approval, the four things it exists to do.
The strategic plan is entitled “Strengthening the mana of teaching, so teachers can change lives”.
Is child safety mentioned? No
Are teacher standards mentioned? No
Instead, and I quote directly, the five strategic priorities were:
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Supporting teachers to manage current and emerging challenges in teaching
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Proudly communicating the value and expertise of teachers as professionals
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Growing the leadership capabilities of all teachers
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Supporting principals and ECE leaders to lead organisations
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Building partnerships to reflect and embody our Tangata Tiriti responsibilities throughout our organisation
Cabinet agreed to move the setting of teaching standards, registration criteria and the code of conduct to the Secretary for Education, strip “raising the status of the profession” out of the Council's purpose, shrink the board, and give the Council real teeth over teacher-training programmes.
Then came the Francis review, which found the Council had lost focus on safeguarding children and at times acted more like an advocacy body than a regulator.
In May 2026 the Minister went further: every board member ministerially appointed, child safety elevated in the Council's statutory purpose, and a duty to give effect to government policy while keeping independence in individual cases.
The Act passed on 23 June 2026 and took effect on 6 July.
Some key voices in the sector have been waging a war since via the media and online.
The KC report reads like a case study proving the Cabinet papers right.
A regulator that wanted to be liked by the profession put a police child-safety warning in the too-hard basket.
What this means for your child
- The Council now has one job. Its purpose in law is child safety and teaching quality.
- Someone is watching. The Council must now report monthly to the Ministry on completed actions, deadlines, and how many cases are waiting and how old they are. The Minister's letter of expectations requires it to urgently find teachers working without current certificates, fast-track high-risk cases and improve support for complainants.
- Schools can finally trust the register. The whole system rests on principals being able to rely on what the council tells them. When the register says a teacher is safe to employ, that has to be true. Monthly reporting, a child-safety purpose and the Clean Slate change are what make that promise real again.
- The board is built for the job. Instead of elected representatives balancing the interests of the people they regulate, the Council is now a skills-based board with expertise in child protection, regulation and governance. The Ministry's own impact statement conceded this reduces the teacher viewpoint at the table. After Fisher, we think that trade-off is right: a regulator cannot also be a union's seat.
- Standards are set by the government you elect, with a required review at least every seven years. That means the expectations for teaching reading, maths and classroom behaviour can be kept in line with the curriculum and the evidence, rather than drifting for a decade.
- Teacher training gets a real regulator. The Council can now put conditions on teacher-education programmes, revoke approvals and demand information from providers. That matters when 60 percent of principals say new teachers aren't ready when they start.
- The gap that let Fisher in is being closed. Cabinet has just approved changes to the Clean Slate Act so police can give the council more information about past convictions when it vets a teacher.
What parents should hold onto
The KC was clear that the law didn't keep Fisher in classrooms; the Council's culture did. These reforms go directly at that culture.
Whoever forms the next government, including a Labour-led one, must keep these reforms in place and not roll them back under pressure from sector groups and the unions.
Child safety and teacher quality cannot be up for negotiation. Our kids’ safety and education are too important. And teachers deserve much, much better.
The Teaching Council itself asks every teacher to live by four values:
- Whakamana: empowering all learners to reach their highest potential;
- Manaakitanga: creating a welcoming, caring and creative learning environment that treats everyone with respect and dignity;
- Pono: showing integrity by acting in ways that are fair, honest, ethical and just; and
- Whanaungatanga: engaging in positive and collaborative relationships with learners, their families and whānau, colleagues and the wider community.
It demanded all four of every teacher and showed none of them in return. Least of all to the children it existed to protect.
We can’t speak for how the teaching profession feels about the Fisher file but we will speak for parents and their kids:
Every person who sat on the Teaching Council between 2015 and 2025 should hang their heads in shame.
If this has brought anything up for you or your family, Safe to Talk is free and confidential, 24/7: call 0800 044 334 or text 4334.
This week from the Parents’ Alliance
Now that’s out of the way - gulp - it's been a busy week as the parties roll out their election policies.
Here's what we've said since last Friday:
All our releases are at parentsalliance.nz/media-
Parents' Alliance welcomes consistent school term dates (Sunday 11 October). We welcomed National's pledge to set nationally consistent start and finish dates for schools, which will make life easier for families with children at more than one school. We also said we want to see more detail on the proposed new school leaving age before taking a position, given how hard it will be to keep disengaged students engaged, and the risk that exemptions get used more often instead of lifting achievement. Read the release
Parents' Alliance welcomes Labour's pledge to work to restore rural school buses (Sunday 11 October). You can't fix attendance if children can't reach the school gate. We welcomed Labour's commitment as good for attendance, and asked for a published cost-benefit analysis so routes are restored where they deliver real value. Read the release
Parents' Alliance cautiously welcomes ACT's fiscal plan but needs to know more (Monday 12 October). We backed ACT's new unzoned Epsom secondary school with two leading educators at the helm, the Year 11 Investors Fund and a portable Working with Children Check. But ACT needs to define what counts as “frontline” education, because learning support, curriculum resources and teacher training largely sit outside the school gate. Read the release
New poll shows Kiwis back the hour-a-day reading, writing and maths requirement (Tuesday 13 October). 74 percent support, 15 percent oppose, and a majority in every demographic. Full story above. Read the release
Teaching Council's failings indefensible (Wednesday 14 October). Our response to the KC report: the Council badly let down children, parents and the many good teachers whose professional body is meant to uphold their standards. The Minister was right to take charge, and whoever forms the next government must keep the reforms in place. Read the release
Anya on Newstalk ZB with Heather du Plessis-Allan (Wednesday 14 October). Anya said every person who sat on the Council between 2014 and 2025 should hang their heads in shame, because this was a failure of the people in charge. She welcomed the Minister stepping in and said parents now expect the reforms to stay, whoever wins the election. Listen to the interview
Our first Parents' Guide: Structured literacy, what parents need to know
Our first Parents' Guide is live. It explains in plain language what structured literacy is, why New Zealand has moved to it, and what you should expect to see in your child's classroom. There's a two-part podcast to go with it, so you can listen in the car.
Read the guide and listen to the podcast
Things you can do today
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Membership is free, and numbers matter. The more parents standing behind us, the harder it will be to exclude us. The Teaching Council debacle demonstrates more than ever how we need commonsense in the debate.
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Thank you
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Until next time,
Cameron Bagrie (Chair) and Anya Zohrab (Executive Director)
The Parents' Alliance Te Kotahitanga o ngā Mātua, Le Lotogatasi o Mātua, 家长联盟, पारिवारिक मंच