Seeking evidence of students being pulled out of math, english and science class to attend Te Reo lessons
H Atkins made this Official Information request to David Seymour
The request was successful.
From: H Atkins
Kia ora David Seymour,
I would like to request under your capacity as Associate Minister of Education,
All briefings, aide memories, emails, texts and cabinet papers backing the Minister's claim that students are required to be pulled out of math, English and science classes to attend Te Reo lessons.
Please provide all material in an accessible format where text to speech is available for the vison impaired.
Ngā mihi,
H Atkins
From: David Seymour (MIN)
David Seymour
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From: David Seymour (MIN)
David Seymour
Dear H Atkins
Thank you for your email in which you submitted an Official Information
Act request as follows:
“All briefings, aide memories, emails, texts and cabinet papers backing
the Minister's claim that students are required to be pulled out of math,
English and science classes to attend Te Reo lessons.”
We received your request on Tuesday 26 November 2024. We will endeavour to
respond to your request as soon as possible and in any event no later than
Tuesday 24 December 2024, being 20 working days after the day your request
was received. If we are unable to respond to your request by then, we will
notify you of an extension of that timeframe.
Kind regards, Annette
Annette Gratkowski | Private Secretary Executive
Support
Office of Hon David Seymour
[1]A pink and white Deputy Prime Minister (from 31 May 2025)
emblem with two
women holding flags Minister for Regulation
Description Associate Minister of Education
automatically
generated Associate Minister of Justice
Associate Minister of Finance
Associate Minister of Health
DDI 04 817 6333 | 7.6 Executive Wing, Parliament
Buildings
DSOIA345
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From: David Seymour (MIN)
David Seymour
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H Atkins DSOIA345.pdf
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DSOIA345 docs Redacted.pdf
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Dear H Atkins
Please find attached response to your information request of 26 November
2024.
Kind regards,
Office of Hon David Seymour
[1]A pink and Deputy Prime Minister (from 31 May 2025)
white emblem
with two women Minister for Regulation
holding flags Associate Minister of Education
Description
automatically Associate Minister of Justice
generated
Associate Minister of Finance
Associate Minister of Health
7.6 Executive Wing, Parliament Buildings, Wellington
DSOIA345
show quoted sections
From: H Atkins
Dear David Seymour (MIN),
Thank you for your response, I note no section of the Act has been supplied on the redacted information. under section 19(a)(ii) I request you provide these grounds.
I also note that the information has not been provided in the way specified. As per section 16(3) of the Act I request to know why the Information provided has not been provided in the way specified by my request.
I note that the Office is likely on Holiday at this period. While a full response is due by 24 December, I will await your response to my above queries before I consider reaching out to the Ombudsman. If I do not hear from the Office before 22 January I will be forced to make a complaint to the Ombudsman.
Ngaa mihi,
H Atkins
Joanna McLeod left an annotation ()
Checking the dates carefully, almost all of the anecdotal ‘evidence’ here was received by David Seymour’s office AFTER this FYI request was made, so therefore could not have been used as evidence for his initial claim of students being pulled out of other classes to learn Māori.
Things to do with this request
- Add an annotation (to help the requester or others)
- Download a zip file of all correspondence
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H Atkins left an annotation ()
It appears the Minister's Office only hold anecdotal evidence provided by member's of the public. No grounds have been used in this request, but information has been redacted. One can assume the grounds used were 9(2)(a) to protect Privacy of natural persons, but it's hard to know this without any mention of grounds used in the letter, or provided documents which are scanned emails.
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