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You have to hand it to newly minted Education Minister Roland Hache.

He didn't waste any time making his mark on his new department.

The first thing he did after being named the minister last week was freeze all spending, including the sacred cow of the Department of Education - the Innovative Learning Fund.

That is an important and impressive first move.

The fund was the brainchild of former education minister Kelly Lamrock, who set it up to reward the creativity of teachers by funding their unique ideas on teaching and learning.

By last fall, $4.1 million had been spent on 421 of these great ideas, and more than $618,000 of it was spent in District 18. His fund has financed hands-on learning projects on diverse topics from robotics and technology to fractions, literacy, geography and cooking.

Lamrock, perhaps in an effort to offset the bad news of laid-off library assistants and teacher assistants, cut the budget of his Innovative Learning Fund this spring, but that didn't make up for the blatant hostility. If letters to the editor are an indication, there are plenty of ticked off school support workers affected by the cuts to education and parents whose children will be affected.

Now the New Brunswick Teachers' Federation and the school support workers are anxiously waiting to hear if the $3.35 million in the Innovative Learning Fund will be spent to re-instate the $2.9 million education cut that saw 588 full- and part-time support workers laid off.

There's enough money to do that, with a bit left over, and we believe rehiring those laid-off workers would be the best move politically and financially - the government needs some positive news, people need their jobs and students need support at school.

The teachers' union has always disliked the fund. They don't want their member teachers rewarded by any other means than through their negotiated contract, and they say the money for the fund came straight out of the classroom in the first place.

But Lamrock had a good idea in creating the fund. It is wise to reward creativity and keep those innovative projects supported, all in an effort to make learning easier for children.

The problem with the fund in this recession economy is that it is a frill - a luxury that we can no longer afford.

When you're dealing with a growing deficit and the economy is in the pits, and you're forced to lay off 588 support staff, holding on to luxuries indicates someone's priorities are not in order.

Thankfully, it appears Hache is seeing the issue more clearly than his predecessor did.

When the economy rebounds, the deficit has disappeared and we are back in the black, the concept of the Innovative Learning Fund can be revisited, and it may well prove to be worthy of rebirth.

But in the meantime, there are far more important ways to spend taxpayer money, beginning with the rehiring of support staff.