Rowan Ramsey (Grey, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I have spent three months on an inquiry with the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Education and Employment looking at the Australian Education Bill 2012—the first version, or the version without amendments, it must be said; the 1,400 words, the aspirational bill—and I have not come across one person, including the members of the coalition, who seriously disliked the bill. But, of course, it was an aspirational bill, and largely there is nothing in it. So we have had three months looking at a bill that said nothing, and now, at the eleventh hour of this parliament—some could say, in fact, five minutes to midnight for this parliament—the government brings in 71 pages of amendments to that bill, still with no clarity about what it means in individual dollars for individual schools. It does have funding formulas in there; but, of course, we cannot fill out the Xs and Ys in an algebraic fashion to know exactly what that funding means. We are given no time at all to discuss, to discover, to explore what these amendments mean for Australian schools.

I consider it my responsibility as deputy chair of that committee to make sure that legislation we do not fully understand is not passed through this place. It is the committee's job to explore the bills so they can explain to the parliament what it is that changes markedly, that changes the way we do business in Australia—in this case, the way we do business in the education sector. Quite seriously I cannot give that advice to the parliament. Our dissenting members' report, for instance, highlighted the lack of detail and lack of good process where the government seem to be virtually thumbing their nose at the parliament, saying, 'We have the numbers.' That is the only thing that matters at the end of the day. 'We have the numbers,' and we presume that sometime today the government are going shut off the debate on this bill and use those numbers to push the bill through the parliament when we do not know what it means and neither does any school in Australia.

It has been a great frustration to the committee throughout that inquiry that, while some of the leading educators in Australia have come to speak to us, those very few that were inside the beltway and had some idea of where the negotiations were going were not at liberty to discuss those negotiations with the committee that is supposed to report to the parliament and give advice on how this bill is going to affect their everyday lives. The rest of the contributors just do not know. They do not have any idea. There is absolute confusion out there. Most of those in the education sector are being asked to take the government at trust. If the last three years have taught us anything about this government, it is that you cannot trust them. You cannot trust their word. They say not only 'Trust us on this bill, and it will be alright on 1 January next year' but also 'Trust us; we're going to take $300 million out of education, but you're going to be better off in five years time.' That is the kind of trust the government is asking schools and the education sector to take them on. Quite clearly the members of the coalition on the education and employment committee could not recommend that this bill be passed on that basis.

We asked that the bill lie on the table until the detail is provided. Apparently about 12 hours ago the minister provided the detail, but we have not yet had the opportunity to have a look at that detail. As we expressed in our dissenting report, we believe strongly that, once that detail is provided, it should come back to the education and employment committee to reconsider and not have a 24-hour, 48-hour or three-day inquiry as many of the bills in the education and employment sector that are being referred back to that committee in this time are. It should have a genuine inquiry that will give the educators and the schooling systems of Australia the opportunity to fully explore what this legislation means for them—what these amendments mean. As of today, as far as I know, they do not know, and that is a very serious concern for all educators in Australia.

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