Manitoba's Education Minister took the opportunity to address the public today, one day after our Interim Premier announced the scrapping of Bill 64.

Bill 64 or the Education Modernization Act would have established a new governance model for Kindergarten to Grade 12 education.

Steinbach MLA Kelvin Goertzen was sworn in as Interim Premier Wednesday morning. It did not take him long to announce that five bills scheduled to go to a vote when the Legislature resumed this fall, will not go forward, including the highly-contested Bill 64.

"The governance model was certainly a lightning rod, we recognize that," says Education Minister Cliff Cullen. "So we are scrapping Bill 64, obviously we heard that from Manitobans."

Cullen says the need to scrap Bill 64 became increasingly more clear just recently.

"Once we got an opportunity to collectively get together and discuss our options, it became quite clear that people were not satisfied with the governance model we had in Bill 64," admits Cullen. "So those conversations just happened over the last several weeks."

Cullen says the province will continue to engage with Manitobans as it moves forward. But, he says the process of instituting their strategy is a journey, not a sprint.

"It's about priorities right now and clearly our priority is wanting to make sure our students and staff are safe over the next few months as we battle the fourth wave," he says.

Cullen notes they will be announcing additional task forces in the future and continue to gather information. But, he notes they do want the new Premier of our province to have a clean slate when he or she takes office.

Cullen says this is now a chance to pause and reflect on what has been said, noting the discussion and governance model created tension among stakeholders.

"I think this is a real opportunity for us to build those relationships, gather their input," he says. "Certainly my role as a minister will be to gather information, clear the table for the new leader and provide as much information as I can to the new leader."

Meanwhile, Cullen says it is too early to speculate whether the amalgamation of school divisions might yet happen one day. He also assures Manitobans that their plan to phase out education property tax is very much still alive, noting those are two very different initiatives.