‘Wasteful spending must stop’

Press, 6 May 1988, Page 1

‘Wasteful spending must stop’

Reducing inflation, unemployment, and the public debt should be contral to the Royal Commission on Social Policy report, due today, said the chairman of the New Zealand Business Roundtable, Sir Ronald Trotter, last evening. Addressing the Lincoln College Old Students’ Association, he said the commission’s first report showed a clear concern for children. But there was little sign that the commission had “grasped the point that the single most important impediment to our children’s welfare is the mountain of public debt which we have bestowed upon them,” he said.

The solution must include stopping wasteful spending on social services, Sir Ronald said. Health and education were huge industries accounting for more than 10 per cent of gross domestic product. The Gibbs report had exposed a degree of waste in public hospitals and a “similar malaise” would no doubt be revealed in the education system, Sir Ronald said. The Picot report on education administration is due next week. “The business sector has become much more conscious of the performance of the education system and will expect the Government to - produce results,” Sir Ronald said.

There was a debate about whether New Zealand education standards had declined, said Sir Ronald. “That such a debate exists is a damaging commentary on our education administration, including the virtual non-exist-ence of reliable education research, that we do not have precise information on education performance,” he said. A Business Roundtable study on tertiary education will be released next month. Sir Ronald said a striking feature of “free” university education was that it represented a huge distribution of income from the poorer to richer mem-

bers of society because most students come from better-off families and graduates earned above-average salaries. In Britain, tertiary education has been estimated to present a transfer of $5 to the rich for every $1 to the poor. “There is a strong case, on both efficiency and equity grounds, for relying on loans rather than grants as a general means of financing tertiary education, with scholarships made available on a generous basis to ensure that access is not denied to any capable student,” he said.