Nick Champion (Wakefield, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Education is the key to the future of this country. That is a simple idea that I believe and that this government believes. That is one of the reasons why we made education a core economic issue at the last election and that is why we have put it at the centre of the government’s agenda this year. The Education Legislation Amendment Bill 2008 and the Schools Assistance Bill 2008 before the House today represent a major step in that education revolution. We are committed to building a world-class education system for all Australians.

The Education Legislation Amendment Bill 2008 provides for the continuation of funding for a range of targeted programs and projects under the Indigenous Education (Targeted Assistance) Act 2000. This funding goes to improving Indigenous education outcomes and assisting the communities and schools in closing the gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians—something I certainly support.

Recently I was on a tour at the technical college in my electorate, and there was a group of Indigenous students who were studying at Rostrevor College also there. They were at the technical college having a look at the commercial kitchen and some of the trade courses there. They had come from outback Western Australia, from Kununurra, from Darwin and from Arnhem Land, and it was a tremendous opportunity for them not just to improve their education but also to give them an idea of what was on offer in other parts of the country. So it is a tremendous part of the bill and something that I would certainly commend.

The Schools Assistance Bill represents the government’s commitment to providing funding certainty for every Australian school, no matter what type it is, no matter where it is and no matter how many students it has. In determining schools funding, the government has dispensed with the old politics of the past—and we heard references to the old politics of the past from the member for Herbert. We have dispensed with those politics and made good on our election commitment—that is, that the current SES funding agreement model for 2005-08 with its formula has been the minimum in determining funding for the next funding quadrennium from 1 January 2009 until 31 December 2012. There is going to be minimum upfront funding of $42 billion for all schools over that period and funding of $28 billion for recurrent and capital assistance to non-government schools specifically delivered by this bill. So every school in Australia will get certainty and will be able to plan for the next four years and beyond.

I think it is good that in this bill the government is adding to what schools are getting and not taking away. It ensures that schools like St Mary Magdalene’s School in Elizabeth South, St Columba College in Andrews Farm, St Joseph’s School in Clare, the Horizon Christian School in Balaklava and the Trinity College North campus, which had 80 students in the national parliament just last week, can continue to provide top-quality educational opportunities to students. Despite what the opposition say—both while they were in government and now—the Rudd government is here to add to funding for schools, not wreck them; to lift all the boats; and I think that is an idea that is just sensible and responsible.

The funding provided for by this bill includes an Indigenous funding guarantee as well as reforms to Indigenous supplementary assistance to make sure that schools that cater to Indigenous students receive the support they need and continue to receive that support. The funding in this bill also provides for targeted assistance for the teaching of languages other than English, fir English for new arrivals to Australia, for literacy and numeracy for students with special learning needs as well as for students in country areas.

Many of the non-government schools in Wakefield make a particular effort to support Indigenous students. I think the northern suburbs have got about 50 per cent of the urban Indigenous population of Adelaide. So this funding is certainly welcome in my electorate. This bill will ensure a streamlined $239.1 million fund for Indigenous supplementary assistance is put in place, ensuring that every Indigenous student attracts supplementary funding that is indexed and gives schools greater flexibility in how they cater to the unique needs of Indigenous students.

It is something that is fairly close to my heart. One of my best friends in high school was a fellow named Jimmy Karpany. He was a very smart person but left school in year 10 and, when I reflect back on it, I think it was probably because he and his brother were the only Indigenous students in my high school. He later went on to university and became a very fine police officer. When I think of these measures, I think of him. Tragically, he passed away in a car accident about a year ago, so I would just like to take this opportunity to remember him in this speech.

Importantly, this bill makes school infrastructure funding a priority. Bricks and mortar, facilities, ovals—all of these things are essential to schools functioning and are a key part of the education revolution. This bill delivers over half a billion dollars for this purpose through the capital grants program. This just adds to the education revolution. I do hope that schools like Xavier College, Craigmore High School and the new regional Catholic technical college in Elizabeth can benefit from this infrastructure funding, as well as from funding through the Trade Training Centres in Schools Program. I know they are looking forward to applying for that funding. Both government and non-government schools, I believe, can have a big impact in creating skilled school leavers in the north. I think one of our biggest problems is that we have got areas of acutely high youth unemployment in my electorate. But, not so far away, we have areas like the Barossa Valley which have virtually zero unemployment, so they have problems getting skilled labour. So that is an area that we hope these funds will have some impact on.

This package of funding comes from a government that is determined to fund our schools and to see that that funding works—that it works for teachers, parents and students. That is why the funding is linked to the requirements in the national education agreement, which is currently being finalised by COAG, to make sure that non-government schools are as accountable for their performance as government schools. This link will make sure that non-government schools are involved in meeting the three key national priorities that are central to the strength of the education system: improving the quality of teaching; raising outcomes in disadvantaged school communities; and delivering a new era of transparency that will help to guide parents, teachers and policymakers in making the best possible decisions for our schools.

The central element of transparency is ensuring that there is a simple but effective framework to assess schools’ performances. This bill provides for such a framework so that parents and students know how their school is performing. This will help to ensure that we can all understand how a school performs over time and in relation to schools serving similar communities. This will not lead to the creation of simplistic league tables, which I think have been fairly disastrous in the United States, but instead it will lead to an effective education system that can identify and address the needs of students and schools that might be at educational disadvantage. To identify these risks this bill provides for five simple activities that are essential to achieving transparency. That is five activities, in contrast to the excessively bureaucratic approach of the previous government.

The key activities as a part of this revolution in transparency are: national testing, national outcome reporting, provision and publication of individual school information and reporting to parents. These requirements will apply to all schools in Australia, public or private, and are fundamental to ensuring that parents know how their child is progressing at school and that we as a parliament and a community know where additional assistance is required.

They are really a straightforward set of concepts. National testing in literacy and numeracy will continue for students in years 3, 5, 7 and 9 but will also reach beyond the basics and include such important areas as civics and citizenship and information technology literacy. The results of national testing will be a part of the national reporting requirements of schools and these reporting requirements will also provide information on important aspects of schooling more generally, such as attendance and year 12 attainment. Attendance is a particularly important issue and it is one of the things that I was most shocked about. I have regular meetings with the Education Union in my electorate and one of the more frightening things that came through bits of anecdotal evidence that teachers gave me was that attendance is a big problem, particularly in the transition from primary school to high school. It is an area that we need to focus on.

The collection of this information is important if we are to make sound policy decisions that are about addressing educational disadvantage. Such information will be important as we work with state governments, particularly the state government of South Australia in my case, to make sure that local schools see the rates of truancy drop and the rates of year 12 completion rise in the northern suburbs of Adelaide. As I said, that has been a particular problem in some of these schools in the northern suburbs of Adelaide. Once we have that information we can start to make evidence based allocations of resources to ensure that no Australian is excluded from the opportunity of—or, I might say, the obligation of getting—a great education.

Without information we cannot make realistic assessments about which schools need more support and which schools have discovered something that works. This information is essential in directing those education resources to where they are needed most and in promoting education ideas and concepts. Often it is the teams in the schools and the leadership in the schools that inspire better students. Without this critical information I know it will be those with the most marginal educational opportunities who suffer, who are ignored and who are denied the resources they are entitled to on the basis of their need. The bill also requires more information to be available to parents, including report cards that are in plain language and that provide an accurate assessment of how a child is progressing. These reports will include reference to students’ achievements against key indicators, including the national average, and will allow for a meaningful way of tracking students’ progress through their time at school.

Finally, the bill requires that schools follow a range of accountability procedures from simple requirements for information to be available about a school’s mission and values to the reasonable expectation that non-government schools will successfully complete their independent audits. These are all sensible expectations of the community and reflect the government’s approach to education—investing in opportunity, increasing transparency and delivering better results. When the national education agreement is concluded, government and non-government schools will get their first idea of funding. This framework will ensure that our schools are more transparent and accountable, that parents have a much better idea about how their child is performing and how their school is teaching and that policy makers will have a much better idea how to direct resources. These bills are an important step on the path to a world’s best quality education system and I commend the bills to the House.

See this speech in context