How to Waste a Billion Dollars

Trevor Mallard has finally put a stop to the funding haemoragging to low quality sub-degree courses in Tertiary Education providers.

Labour made this mess happen - of course - by changing the rules so any course could be funded as long as the provider met quality standards. There was no check on the course, students would (in theory) only sign up if there was an educational benefit.

It didn't take long for shrewd providers to realise that they could sign up people if there was other incentives - like free dive gear, free computers, or trips to Australia included in the course. Other operators put on courses at no charge, so students didn't have to apply a cost/benefit logic.

Labour should have realised things were going wrong when accusations of Diving Courses providing no real employment prospects surfaced in 2001. Then there was the huge cost of the Cool-IT course offered by Christchurch Polytech in 2003. Then sing-a-long to radio courss were being offered by Terawhiti Polytech in 2004, but nothing was done.

Only when he spent weeks being grill in Parliament by Opposition MPs about courses being offered like: "Twilight Golf", "Effective Colour of the Human Soul", and "Homeopathy for Pets" did Labour start looking at the problem.

Now Labour has accused National of not being able to afford tax cuts the issue of Low Quality Government spending is looming as a big election issue. National can easily say "Labour spent $1 Billion on crap courses - would you rather that continue or would you rather have the money back?"

So Trevor Mallard has finally acted and shut down this rort after 5 years, probably three years after he should have.