Strong Voices

In December 2025, IHC signed a landmark agreement at Parliament that marks a huge step forward for disabled students and their whānau. This would not have been achieved without the remarkable dedication and resilience of IHC’s members, supporters, staff and Board.

The agreement reached between IHC and the Government resolves IHC’s long-running legal claim regarding access to education for disabled children, first taken to the Human Rights Commission in 2008. Our complaint to the Commission emphasised that access to education for disabled children was a human right and the education system had failed to ensure that right. IHC argued that policies had contributed to disadvantage for, and discrimination against, disabled learners in mainstream schools. Our case was backed by evidence gathered over decades, including the testimony of many brave parents who fought the system.

Kataraina, a mother who spoke at the signing of the agreement, described how her daughter with ‘takiwātanga’ (autism) had to attend school part-time for three years because she wasn’t understood or supported.

“For our children to be respected and valued in society, they need to be respected and valued at school,” she said. “Belonging means that our children are welcomed, understood and accepted for who they are; it means that they have friends, and it means that even if our children are different, everyone puts in the effort to make sure they feel the same.”

The experience of Kataraina and her children is sadly common across Aotearoa New Zealand. Now IHC and the Government have settled this legal action, the work ahead is to change the policies and systems to create the sense of belonging and a meaningful education that all students need.

What this agreement will change

The agreement commits the Ministry of Education to implement a Framework for Action – a set of nine priority areas based on evidence, including Ministry and Education Review Office reports, collected over decades. The Framework was designed by IHC and informed by families, teachers and disabled people themselves. It focuses on fundamental shifts in how the system:

• Understands and responds to learners’ needs through better data collection and reporting
• Provides what disabled ākonga (students) and schools need for learning and wellbeing through a data-informed funding policy
• Improves access to specialist support services and coordinated support
• Encourages curriculum changes that result in disabled ākonga learning alongside their peers with individualised assessment of that learning
• Investigates and develops better and more effective funding to ensure learners and schools receive what they need for successful outcomes
• Moves to ākonga-centred and strengths-based funding policies that focus on what is needed for better access to learning and participation at school.

The Ministry has also agreed to establish an external stakeholder monitoring group of up to eight people to ensure full implementation of IHC’s Framework. IHC will chair the group, and members will include disabled people, tāngata whaikaha  Māori, Pasifika, whānau and others who understand how education system policy settings affect schools, ākonga and their whānau. This group will monitor and guide work on the Framework over at least the next six years.

What this means for students and whānau

This is a win for all disabled students, based on recognition of their fundamental human right to education on an equal basis to their non-disabled peers.  

This is the start of long-term improvements to how the Government supports disabled students, so they have what they need to participate in school life and learn with their peers. For whānau, this means that their choice to enrol their child at their local school will be a positive one. Everything their child needs to thrive at school will be in place, including access to the right support at the right time, from the right people.

It won’t happen quickly, though. The agreement represents the Government’s confirmation that the system is not working for disabled students and must be overhauled. The work to start that wholescale system starts this year and IHC and our supporters will continue to hold the Government accountable to its commitments.

A shared vision of inclusion

The intent of the agreement and Framework are clear: children with disabilities going to their local school with their siblings and friends, learning alongside their peers and participating fully in school life – not on the margins, not part-time, not separated or disadvantaged. This outcome will align the education system with human rights principles and create positive outcomes for all learners, including learners with a disability.

As Kataraina reminded us: “Belonging is a fundamental human need.” When policy-makers, schools and communities embrace that principle alongside practical system support, we can truly make meaningful education accessible to all.

Note: we purposefully use the term “disabled students” rather than “students with disabilities” here. That’s because these students are disabled, not by their nature but by the systems that focus only on their deficits (what they cannot do) rather than their strengths. IHC’s long-running legal action aimed to change that systemic discrimination.

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Image 1: Minister of Education Erica Stanford and IHC Chief Executive Andrew Crisp after signing the landmark education settlement in December 2025.

Image 2: Kataraina (right) with IHC Inclusive Education Lead Trish Grant (left).