Daryl Melham (Banks, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Amendment Bill 2006 aims to provide an additional $43.6 million over a three-year period—2006 to 2008—for Indigenous education and training. It will extend the tutorial assistance program to students in year 9, extend tutorial assistance to TAFE and vocational students, support community festivals that promote health and are anti substance abuse and support school based sporting academies and related activities for Indigenous students.

The extension of assistance for year 9 students restores support that was previously available under the Aboriginal assistance scheme but not under current guidelines. However, I note that this additional money is offset by the tightening of eligibility requirements for Abstudy allowances for Indigenous children under 16 years old.

In addition, the Indigenous Tutorial Assistance Scheme funding guidelines restrict access for students in urban areas. It is a strange state of affairs where funding for Indigenous students relies on competition between urban and remote students, yet this government’s recurrent grants to non-government schools are allocated on a per student basis.

The phrase which comes to mind in relation to this legislation is ‘fiddling around the edges’. There is no substantive upgrade of Indigenous education; there is no significant input into an area where funding is being reduced.

My colleague the member for Jagajaga has outlined some of the ALP’s more detailed concerns about this bill and what it actually represents. One of the matters she raises is that parent-school partnerships are not addressed. In fact, the bureaucracy surrounding these programs further excludes parents and community members. To access even a modest level of funding, schools need to undertake considerable work. This results in teachers and education administrators becoming highly competent submission writers but not actually spending their time in delivering educational outcomes. Indeed, the Senate Employment, Workplace Relations and Education References Committee in June 2005 found in its investigation of Indigenous education that:

1.11 Commonwealth education funding has long been characterised by the imposition of conditions by the Commonwealth, and by a gradual tightening of accountability procedures.

And:

1.13 The leverage strategy of detailed reporting, however, affects the operations of schools which do not have the resources to deal with the reporting requirements.

One submission, from the Association of Independent Schools of South Australia, indicated that, given the relatively small amount of money available, the level of reporting and accountability is an issue of concern, particularly because of the different reporting requirements for different programs.

I addressed this House on a similar bill just over a year ago, on 2 June 2005. That was a significant date because it was one month before the government took full control of the Senate. This government’s form has been to treat Indigenous Australians as second-class citizens. I have seen nothing in the past 13 months to change my mind on that position. I warned then that this government was uniquely placed because of its control of both Houses to address Indigenous issues.

At that time I addressed the notion of community consultation. This government, however, still does not get it. The abiding lesson I learned when dealing with Aboriginal communities is that one must work with them, not try and save them from themselves or impose whitefella solutions on Aboriginal communities.

In its discussion on parental and community support and awareness, the 2005 Senate committee report noted that there were two basic issues underpinning the dissatisfaction with the government’s approach to Indigenous education. The first issue related to the suggestion that the government’s approach indicates a lack of trust in the Indigenous representatives’ good faith. The second issue related to the greatly reduced levels of funding to support educational programs, particularly in student welfare and attendance support. The government’s attitude to funding for Indigenous education is reflected in a very telling comment from that committee, on page 5, which said:

There is a presumption that education funding policy should be determined by what can be reported, rather that what is most necessary for overall success in achieving learning outcomes.

That statement is a clear indictment of this government. It is all about bells and whistles; it is all about show and not about substance.

Of course, it is difficult to find out exactly how much and where the government is spending on Indigenous education. Until the last budget, and post ATSIC, financial information was provided by program by department. While not always easy to decipher, the information was more or less available. This year, the portfolio statements provided extraordinarily broad information. In the education, science and technology portfolio, Indigenous expenditure is reported by three outcomes: schools, post-school and research. The government would probably argue that this reporting provides an easy-to-view summary of expenditure. As long as one is familiar with the details of each outcome, that may well be so. But not many of us are.

A plain-text reading of the Indigenous expenditure by the Department of Education, Science and Training actually shows a projected decrease in expenditure. In outcome 1, expenditure on schools in 2005-06 was $473,192,000. In 2006-07 it will be $461,358,000. In outcome 2, post-school, 2005-06 expenditure was $110,027,000. In 2006-07 it will be $108,860,000. In outcome 3, research, 2005-06 expenditure was $535,000. It will be $451,000 in 2006-07. This is a total of $583,754,000 in 2005-06 compared to $570,669,000 in 2006-07, yet the minister will claim that new money is being provided when, as far as I can tell, money is simply being moved around.

We must remember the context of Indigenous demographics when analysing expenditure on Indigenous education. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples have a relatively young population, with a median age of around 21 years on 2002 Australian Bureau of Statistics figures. The same ABS report, the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Survey of 2002, stated that 39 per cent were under 15 years of age, compared to 20 per cent of the non-Indigenous population.

In 2004, DEST estimated that the Indigenous population is growing at a rate of 5.3 per cent per year. Between 1991 and 1996 the number of Indigenous children under 17 increased by 12 per cent compared to a two per cent increase in non-Indigenous children. Therefore we could reasonably expect to see expenditure on Indigenous education increase to reflect the increase in actual numbers of school age Indigenous children.

We must make a long-term commitment which is meaningful to the education of Indigenous young people. I acknowledge that there are no easy answers. No government has ever found the magic solution to these profound and disturbing matters. But no lasting solution will ever be found where the Indigenous community is marginalised in the process. It is only in consultation with the Indigenous community that we can move forward in identifying solutions which are educationally and culturally acceptable.

We must also remember that Aboriginal children usually operate from a lower economic base than most non-Indigenous children. In identifying the factors impacting on Indigenous education we should consider several factors which operate in the Aboriginal community and rarely in the white community. These include: the link between education and the likelihood of future employment; operating from a base of poverty and the resulting emphasis, or not, on education; the lack of privacy, time and resources for study; the low likelihood of increased workforce participation even when Indigenous people do complete school, TAFE or even university; and the connection between poverty and crime.

The member for Kingsford Smith, in a debate on 2 June 2005, spoke about the OECD inaugural Program for International Student Assessment. One of the findings of that program which is worth reiterating is that learning preferences and behaviours of Indigenous students were different from those of non-Indigenous students. The report also found that Indigenous students have less preference for a competitive learning environment.

These findings represent the essence of my remarks today. This government is relying less and less on Indigenous community input to the education of their children. Yet the findings of the study I have mentioned clearly identify the types of differences apparent in determining learning strategies for Indigenous and non-Indigenous students. Whitefella solutions are not appropriate for Indigenous people. The opposition will support this bill because it does put funding—however little—into Indigenous education. I commend the amendment put by the member for Jagajaga to the House.

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