Bruce Baird (Cook, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is my pleasure to support the Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Amendment Bill 2006 tonight. It is an important step forward in the education of the Indigenous members of our community who, we would all acknowledge, are significantly disadvantaged compared to the rest of the community, and that is a situation that has existed for some time. In terms of quality of life statistics, Indigenous people are expected to live, on average, 17 years less than other Australians. The infant mortality rate of Indigenous infants in Western Australia, South Australia, Queensland and the Northern Territory is more than twice the mortality rate of non-Indigenous infants in those jurisdictions. The Indigenous unemployment rate sits at approximately 15 per cent—more than three times the national average. Of course, in some country towns it is a lot higher than that.

On educational outcomes, the statistics also speak for themselves: only 40 per cent of Indigenous students complete year 12 compared to 76 per cent of non-Indigenous students. The link between health and education status has been well documented. Large numbers of Indigenous students struggle with attendance and learning outcomes as a result of chronic health problems—predominantly middle ear infections and nutritional deficiency. Only 70 per cent of Indigenous primary school students are reaching literacy and numeracy benchmarks compared to 90 per cent of other students.

It is my pleasure to support the purpose of the bill, which is to amend the Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Act 2000 and to provide additional funding of $43.6 million over the 2006 to 2008 period for targeted assistance programs to improve opportunities for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students in school and training. Education is generally considered to be a crucial part of improving social and economic outcomes for Indigenous peoples. A great deal of research has shown that educational participation and success directly affects health and socioeconomic improvements. There are a variety of factors that affect Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people participating in education, such as access to educational institutions, financial limitations and community attitudes. Existing programs that target Indigenous students are aimed at improving outcomes in some areas. However, Indigenous students continue to achieve lower levels of attainment and participation compared to the rest of Australian students.

Within my electorate of Cook, we have a very interesting program in that students who show particular excellence in sport are brought down to the Endeavour High School, located in Caringbah, which is a selective sporting high school. It was set up by a former New South Wales Liberal government under a selective schools initiative. That program has worked very well. In fact, Minister Kemp visited the school and was terribly impressed with the way in which it was developing a whole range of talented, outstanding young people in all types of sporting fields. The school has produced some outstanding Olympians, national basketball team members, baseball team members in the United States and top swimmers. It is very impressive across the board. They are bringing young Aboriginal lads down from the country with particular skills in Rugby League and training them. Many of them have ended up in some of the top Rugby League teams in the competition. In fact, some are in the Sharks, for example.

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