Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am always happy to rise to talk about education. I commend the member for La Trobe for this optimistic matter of public importance motion. I say optimistic because she is seeking the support of those opposite on education, a topic that is in the nation's interest.

Education is my background. Before I became a lawyer and a member of parliament, I worked in the education sector. I worked in state schools in the country and Catholic schools in the city. I worked as a teacher for 11 years and as a union organiser in the independent education sector. I worked as a union organiser all over regional Queensland dealing with the private school sector. I worked with both the very wealthiest schools in Queensland, where I was proud to be the organiser working with the very first protected action at one of our grammar schools, and some of the very poorest schools: some of the private schools in Aboriginal communities and some of the Christian and Catholic schools where people can barely scrape together enough money for uniforms or even, on occasion, for food. That was my background before coming into the parliament. So I do have a particular understanding of education.

Education is a major reason why many of my colleagues here joined the Labor Party in the first place. If you believe in education, if part of your nature is that you like a fight and if you want to change the world, you normally join the Labor Party. If you like a fight but do not want to change the world, you join the Greens. If you do not want to change the world at all, if you do not want to make any difference, you join the National Party. If you do not want to make a difference and you have had a rails run in life, what do you do? You join the Liberal Party.

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