A victory for common sense

The Herald reports:

Police checks on parents and volunteers in schools and early childhood centres will no longer be required under legislation introduced to Parliament by Education Minister Anne Tolley.

Yes Labour were planning police checks on parents and grandparents who turn up to help out at a childcare centre.

Last week Mrs Tolley introduced a replacement bill which kept new rules for part-time staff and contractors, but dropped the requirement for vetting of parents and volunteers.

As is sensible.

The primary teachers’ union, New Zealand Educational Institute, welcomed the news as “common sense”. National president Frances Nelson said the vetting of parents would have led to a drop in parents helping out, especially if they were needed at short notice.

The union had objected when Labour introduced it, arguing it was ridiculous for parents and grandparents helping with a sports team at lunchtime or an individual child with reading in school to be vetted.

Ridiculous indeed.

Ms Nelson said most schools had sensible policies for parental involvement and kept a watchful eye on what was happening around them.

“It would have narrowed the things parents could do in school for no good reason. It didn’t seem sensible to require police vets for every person that helps out just in case they might spend 30 seconds alone with a child.”

NZEI said the problem was small – of 35,000 non-teacher police checks between 2004 and 2006, only seven people were found to have criminal records that caused concern.

That is a 0.02% incidence rate.