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{
    "id": 441269,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/441269/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 302,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "The Senate Majority Leader",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 440,
        "legal_name": "Onesimus Kipchumba Murkomen",
        "slug": "kipchumba-murkomen"
    },
    "content": "(Sen. (Prof.) Kindiki): Mr. Speaker, Sir, thank you for the opportunity to contribute to the debate on this beautiful Report from the Committee on Education, Information and Technology which is one of our committees which has done very well in terms of keeping the spirit of devolution alive. I say so because this is one of the Committees which has been conducting countywide tours across the country, which for me is the game changer in the way Parliament relates with the people we represent. I am very certain that if the Senate continues, through its committees to increasingly engagement with our counties at their level and where they are, we are going to make the Senate the engine and the apex body that will drive devolution to the next level in accordance with the Constitution. It is for this reason that I want to commend the Chairman of the Committee, the Vice Chairman and all the Members for doing a good job and coming up with a great Report which I have had the opportunity to read through. Allow me to say from the outset that when I looked at the objectives of the visit, I thought that perhaps the Committee was a bit ambitious. But reading through this Report and the recommendations, I am happy that those broad objectives were realized and this is a Report that we can use as a House either to generate legislation or policy that will help the drive the early childhood education, information and technology to the next level. Mr. Temporary Speaker, Sir, this visit was about assessing the progress that counties are making in the area of ECD and also in the area of training especially at village polytechnic level. The other objective was to look at the challenges that various counties are facing because counties are not equally placed. The circumstances in the ECD situation in Nairobi are very different from the ECD situation in Tharaka-Nithi, Busia or Garissa. I say so because whereas some of the recommendations of this Report look like general recommendations, a recommendation like the need to ensure that we tackle the problem of hunger among our young children in early childhood education may look like a simple matter maybe in some parts of Nairobi County. But in some counties, unless we compel the Government to ensure that at least for the nursery school and early childhood education that they are fed in school, we are exposing these children to grave risk of dying from hunger or not even attending early childhood education at all. This is a Report that can help us tackle some of these problems by looking at the experiences of different counties with regard to early childhood education but also with regard to training at polytechnic and technical training generally. What has come out from this Report as I look at it is that there has been a perennial problem of poor pay for ECD teachers yet these are the people we entrust with the most vulnerable stage in the learning life of our children. So, I think there is need for a policy on remuneration as the Report suggests the way we compensate those who teach our small children. The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposes only. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor, Senate."
}