59009 (2025). Hon Jan Tinetti to the Associate Minister of Education

Written Question

Published date: 22 Jan 2026

Metadata

Document type:	Written Question
Parliament number:	54
Question number:	59009 (2025)
Question asked:	16 Dec 2025
Member asking:	Hon Jan Tinetti
Portfolio:	Associate Minister of Education
Minister replying:	Hon David Seymour
Answer received:	15 Jan 2026
Status:	Question Answered
Reply type:	Reply
Document ID:	WQ_59009_2025
Document guid:	3e91b588-005b-443e-a53e-e483b0b804c1

59009 (2025). Hon Jan Tinetti to the Associate Minister of Education: Will he commit to a timeline for achieving pay parity for all qualified early childhood teachers; if not, why not?

Hon David Seymour: As the Member will be aware, while she was the Minister of Education, in September 2023, the Government decided the pay parity opt-in scheme was not fiscally sustainable and agreed to stop matching the pay steps required in the scheme to those contained in the collective agreement for kindergarten teachers from December 2023. At this point in time, I have no plans to reintroduce these requirements. This is also my response to written parliamentary questions 59013, 59014, 59015 and 59016 (2025).