National is focused on improving health and education for all New Zealanders. We want our kids to be taught the basics brilliantly, and we want every Kiwi to have access to timely, high-quality healthcare.
From October 2025, women aged 70 and 74 are eligible for free breast screening – the first step in our nationwide age extension.
This means more women will have the opportunity to detect breast cancer early, when treatment is most effective. Once fully rolled out, around 130,000 additional women will be eligible for free screening every two years.
We’re backing this up with real investment – training and recruiting more staff, purchasing new equipment, opening new screening sites, and delivering mobile screening units. These improvements will make screening faster, simpler, and more convenient, whether one lives in a city or a rural community.
In education, we’ve put ambition and achievement back at the heart of the system so Kiwi kids are set up for success. Our relentless focus on teaching the basics brilliantly is already delivering results.
Since Term 1, all primary schools have been using structured literacy approaches and the new English curriculum, with phonics checks for new entrants at 20 weeks. More children are becoming confident readers, with fewer needing extra support.
Nationally, 58 per cent of new entrants are meeting or exceeding expectations, up from 36 per cent, and those exceeding expectations have more than doubled.
The latest research from the Education Review Office shows half of primary teachers report improvements in students’ English and maths, while more than three-quarters of parents see progress in their child’s learning.
More Kiwi students will soon be learning in warm, safe, dry classrooms, with 82 new classrooms and a new school being built across New Zealand.
National has halved the cost of building a new classroom to $620,000 – down from $1.2 million under Labour – meaning we can deliver more learning spaces for more students.
This is part of our plan to lift achievement and ensure every Kiwi child has the opportunity to reach their full potential.