New free education policy before house

A NEW free education policy to be tabled in parliament would look at the control mechanism and possible transfer of the functions to the provinces.
Education Minister James Mara­pe said this during question time in parliament last Thursday.
He said schools were expected to submit their expenditure reports and acquittals to their respective district administrators by this month to be furnished to the Education Department by May so that they could qualify for the second batch of the fee tuition fees.
He urged education standard officers to ensure that the funds were reported correctly by the schools and that they were used for their intended purposes.
Marape, who is also Finance Minister, was responding to West New Britain Governor Sasindran Muthuvel, who asked what measures were in place to control the unbudgeted spending by school boards and head teachers of the tuition fees.
He added that under the new policy, the department could consider putting in place a control mechanism.
“The policy would mean that fee education will be compulsory in PNG for the next five years so long as the government under Peter O’Neill is in power,” he said.
Marape said the policy might also enable the transfer of some functions to the provinces, particularly provinces like Enga that had a well-established education administration system.
He said until the new policy was approved by parliament, the national government had ensured the funds were sent directly to schools.