Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Women's Issues) Share this | Hansard source

The performance of the member for Perth underscores why Labor can never be trusted to be in government: because they have a track record of failure. They have a track record of failed economic management and they have a track record of failed education policies. Today’s so-called policy announcement by the member for Perth is just further evidence that Labor do not have an original thought at present, particularly with respect to the important area of education. They do not have an original thought.

The announcement of the development of a national curriculum is a direct copy of Howard government policy. It is a Howard government proposal that is already on the agenda for the education ministers meeting in April. Sorry, boys, you are four months late. The announcement of the development of a national curriculum is Howard government policy copied directly. What is now patently obvious is that Labor’s education statements are just a mishmash of recycled failed Labor policies.

Let us remember the great hoopla that surrounded the last attempt they made at dealing with education. Do we remember ‘noodle nation’? That was Labor’s great attempt at an education policy. I recall how embarrassed they all were when it unravelled. The member for Grayndler had to confess, ‘Well, I know some of you were disappointed with the Knowledge Nation package.’ Disappointed would have to be an understatement. The member for Melbourne said, ‘Well, it was an example of what not to do next time.’ Alan Ramsey, from the Sydney Morning Herald, put it quite succinctly. He said:

In one mad moment, with his incomprehensible bird’s nest sketch of 23 circles and 40 train lines—

remember that, Member for Melbourne?—

Barry Jones made Kim Beazley’s Knowledge Nation an instant national joke ...

Now I think that was unfair to Barry Jones and to the member for Brand. They took the rap for it. In fact we now know that the authors of noodle nation, the disgraced, discredited Labor policy—and I am reading from the front page of the noodle nation document—were none other than the current Leader of the Opposition, the member for Griffith, and the member for Perth.

We know that they have even stolen their current slogan from the disgraced, discredited former leader. There is no love lost, I understand, between the member for Griffith and the former member for Werriwa. Nevertheless, that did not stop them, in one of the most apparent pieces of plagiarism I have seen for a while, from adopting Mark Latham’s slogan from his book What did you learn today? Creating an education revolution. They do not even have an original idea when it comes to a slogan. Relying on Mark Latham for educational inspiration is a rather interesting occurrence within the current Labor Party. This is the man Labor offered up as the alternative Prime Minister but who is most famous for his schools hit list. Remember the next Labor policy that failed in ignominy—the schools hit list, where he wanted to rip funding out of schools. What was the schools’ only crime? They happened to be non-government schools. These schools were targeted by Labor because they were non-government schools, and the ugly politics of envy still reside within the Labor Party. Don’t worry: they still have a schools hit list; they are just not hitting them directly. They are going to strangle the schools and freeze their funding so that, over time, the schools will lose money from their budgets. So Labor has a schools hit list, and they have noodle nation. So what do they now come up with? They come up with Mark Latham’s education revolution. All this has revealed that their policy development continues to be sloppy. Labor do not do their homework on policy development.

The announcement in relation to maths and science reveals how lazy they are in their approach to policy development. There is no research to support their claims. In fact, all the evidence is to the contrary. They come up with a policy to fiddle with the integrity of the HECS system—a system that federal Labor introduced in 1989—and that policy has the potential to seriously undermine it. Don’t just take it from me; the architect of the HECS system, Professor Bruce Chapman, a man employed by the Labor Party to design HECS, said, in relation to the member for Perth’s new policy, that cutting HECS was very unlikely to have any effect at all and that it is a bad idea in general to be cutting or changing HECS. This is the architect of the HECS system. Not only is Bruce Chapman against this policy; Australian and international research has shown repeatedly that reducing HECS does not impact on student choice. That is not how you get students to study maths and science at university. The evidence shows that some universities cut HECS in maths and science to zero but there was no increase in student demand. This is all recorded; it is all on the public record. This is all evidence that the member for Perth could have accessed, if he were not so lazy when it came to policy development and if he had bothered to do his homework. Students are influenced by likely career prospects and what they perceive to be the status of jobs and careers. But, in the unkindest cut of all, the Queensland education union wrote off Labor’s policy by saying that reducing HECS would not work. So they even have the Queensland education union against them. This policy of Labor’s will not work, and it is designed to undermine HECS.

As I said, Labor introduced HECS. It is regarded internationally as one of the fairest student contribution schemes in the world. We should not be undermining it; we should be supporting it. Students pay no up-front fees. They contribute 25 per cent, and the taxpayer picks up the balance of 75 per cent. Students repay their interest-free contribution through the tax system only when their income exceeds $38,000. HECS is not like a bank debt with set repayments and so on. Payments commence only when students have the money to afford it. It is income contingent—when students are reaping the benefits, the rewards of their studies. So the ALP policy in trying to cut HECS has missed the point entirely.

The Howard government is focusing on increasing student participation in science and maths in primary schools and secondary schools. Arguably one of our greatest living scientists, the astronaut Andy Thomas, said recently that we need to engage children at a young age to spark their curiosity and interest in science, and that is where we must focus our efforts. And that is where the Australian government, the Howard government, is focusing its efforts.

What is more, the Labor policy says nothing about the state of teaching of maths and sciences in our schools. Why is that? It is because our schools are run by state Labor governments. A recent report commissioned by the Australian government revealed a disturbing picture of 27 different mathematics courses across Australia in year 12. The only thing these 27 different maths courses, created by the eight state and territory education authorities, had in common was that every single course lacked the critical elements our students needed to study maths at a higher level.

To highlight the fact that the Howard government is right in focusing on teaching maths and science in schools, in contrast to Labor’s policy, there is this example: the Queensland education minister recently decided to set up selective schools in that state which will have a much stronger focus on maths and science—and I say good on him; that is a positive effort by the Queensland education minister to do something in schooling. But the first thing he did was to exempt those schools from the official state government curriculum in maths and science. If that is not a statement that the curriculum, as it is being developed by the states, is not up to par, I do not know what is. What he is saying is that these students will study the international baccalaureate—do not let the bright students in Queensland be subjected to the Queensland curriculum, by any means, in maths and science. This reinforces my call for greater national consistency and higher standards in curriculum, which should be internationally benchmarked to ensure that we have world-class curricula in this country.

This is where the problem lies in the education system around the country. While I welcome Labor announcing today that it is going to adopt my plan for a nationally consistent school curriculum, it is astounding political naivety on the part of federal Labor to think that the state governments are all of a sudden going to roll over and adopt a national curriculum of their own free will. The member for Perth has already said that he does not want to impose anything on the states. The states have had decades to voluntarily come together to establish a national curriculum body and develop nationally consistent curricula, but to date there has been staunch opposition.

Together, the education unions in concert with state Labor governments have rejected this approach out of hand, and the member for Perth turning up on the doorstep and having a cup of tea with them is not going to do it. It is so politically naive to think that is going to happen. On issues of national importance, state Labor governments have shown little willingness to put aside parochial self-interest and the self-interest of unions. They have refused to put the interests of students and parents first on this issue. The difference between our policy and that announced by federal Labor today is that we will be able to deliver on it; we will make it a condition of funding. But federal Labor will never be able to deliver on this policy. They are beholden to the same education unions that are so powerful within the state education bureaucracies and state Labor governments.

The Commonwealth does not run state government schools, but it does invest billions of dollars. The taxpayer of Australia, through the federal government, invests billions of dollars in our schools—$33 billion under the current funding arrangement. During the next funding agreement we will be providing around $42 billion, and the Howard government are determined that we will achieve higher standards and greater national consistency through that investment. The Howard government have already implemented a bold reform agenda in education. It has delivered a remarkable dividend, but we are only halfway through that journey.

Former Howard government minister David Kemp brought a great focus on raising numeracy and literacy standards. And next year, in 2008, for the first time we will have national assessment of literacy and numeracy standards in years 3, 5, 7 and 9. It will be the first time because we made it a condition of funding. The states will be held to account for what they are teaching students in terms of literacy and numeracy in our schools. We will have comparative data for the first time. Did the states willingly come to the table and say, ‘Let’s have national testing and compare what we are doing state by state’? No. We made it a condition of funding.

Former education minister Nelson built on that great work of former minister Kemp, and he also brought a focus on values based education. It is what parents have been calling out for and the states could have delivered. It took the Commonwealth, through Minister Nelson, to take a leadership role on values based education. The Howard government is building on that agenda but over the past 10 years has focused consistently on performance, accountability and values. We are also taking a leadership role in the drive for higher standards in numeracy and literacy, national consistency in school starting ages, greater national consistency in school curricula, greater national consistency in year 12 certificates, greater national consistency in testing, principal autonomy, performance pay for teachers and improving teacher quality.

That is the agenda of the Howard government. It is already on the education minister’s agenda. In addition to providing record levels of funding in education, we are focused on what is being taught, how it is being taught, by whom, and what the results and outcomes are that are being achieved for that record level of investment. The Howard government have a clear and consistent policy platform under which we are going to take a leadership position in line with the expectations of parents across the country in the drive for improved literacy and numeracy, higher standards across the board and values.

The Howard government has been able to provide record levels of funding in education. We have delivered a 160 per cent increase in schools funding since 1996. There has been a 118 per cent increase in our funding to government schools, even though the enrolments have only increased by just over one per cent. There has been a 26 per cent increase in university funding. There has been an 88 per cent increase in funding for vocational and technical education. I know Labor always trots out this selective—mischievously selective, I might say—figure from the OECD to falsify the picture of tertiary funding. But I rely on the Australian government budget papers, the official analysis of the Australian Public Service and the Department of Education, Science and Training, rather than Labor’s preference for outdated, highly selective, heavily qualified statistics from the OECD. There are so many conditions attached to the OECD funding analysis that they make it meaningless, but that does not stop the member for Perth from trotting it out as gospel. Labor knows perfectly well that the claim about a seven per cent decline in funding is false. (Time expired)

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