The office of Education Minister Anne Tolley was asked for her response to principals and parents who criticised the proposed reduction of Remarkables Primary School's (RPS) enrolment zone as a "Band-Aid" measure, given the pupil population boom in the Wakatipu.
Mrs Tolley was asked what plans the ministry had for new schools in the area, what the timetable for construction was, where they would be built and when they would open.
A statement attributed to Mrs Tolley said there were places for all the school-age children in the area next year and the year after.
"We are well aware there will soon be a need for another primary school - the ministry will keep a close eye on demographics - and the building of a new school could well be brought forward if that is what is needed," the statement said.
"In the short term, the current roll of Remarkables Primary School is 341 and the school has a capacity of 460. In additional, the existing network of schools ... has surplus capacity of approximately 120 places.
"Most of these are at Queenstown Primary School."
Mrs Tolley said she recently approved the integration of KingsView School, which "will also help alleviate long-term roll growth."
On current roll growth patterns, RPS was likely to be overcrowded in 2014, she said.
"Therefore the ministry has written to the board of trustees asking the board to amend its current enrolment scheme - with families not in the scheme able to attend Queenstown Primary School.
"The ministry and the board are also considering a transitional arrangement that would allow siblings of current students to be eligible for enrolment at Remarkables Primary School so that families would be kept together."
Mrs Tolley said the board also suggested the option of a split campus, which the ministry was considering. That proposed a year 6 to 8 campus of RPS be built next to the proposed new secondary school.
Wakatipu Education Community Group member Kate Smith asked yesterday where the proposed secondary school would be built.
"I think that's a great deal of lip service. It doesn't really address the immediacy of the problem now and what are they using as their statistics, because the Plunket birth figures had about 300 5-year-olds coming online [in 2014]. How is that accommodated by 120 places?"
She thought the ministry was saying, "with polite sugar coating", it did not believe the community's concerns about overcrowding and was "sticking with its original proposal of vaguely saying it will build a new school at some time in the future. There is nothing tangible in any of that to work from and I don't agree with their figures."
