Andrew Giles (Scullin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Schools) Share this | Hansard source

What an extraordinary contribution from the previous speaker, the member for Fisher. I think it is worth reflecting on. How eloquent a summary he has given of the government's budget insofar as it relates to education! He had nothing to say about it, as the first government speaker following the Assistant Minister for Vocational Education and Skills. I wish her the best of luck in responding to those questions and particularly in addressing them to the budget, which, no doubt, she's very proud to speak to.

The assistant minister opened her contributions by saying that the government is absolutely committed to high-quality education outcomes and value for money. Well, this is a government that has shown in this budget that it has no priority for education, whether it's for early years, for universities—as my friend the member for Griffith will touch upon—for schools or for TAFE on what is, today, National TAFE Day. What the education components of this budget do is bake in inequality. A government that spoke stridently and deeply inaccurately about aspiration in question time is denying millions of Australians the opportunity for social mobility and personal development, which should be the cornerstone of education at every level.

It is very disappointing. I have the greatest respect for the assistant minister. I think she should be a minister, but the fact remains she is not, and the minister who is responsible has not seen fit to come here. I'm very disappointed, for a few reasons. One thing the Minister representing the Minister for Education and Training has done is show that he is actually capable, from time to time, of engaging in cooperative federalism. Whether he can convince his party room of the merits of that, I don't know—in fact, I'm pessimistic. But that's the opposite of how this government has dealt with school education. It has shown an attitude that can only be described as uncooperative federalism. I'd be interested in how the assistant minister can inform me and constituents, particularly in Tasmania, the Northern Territory and South Australia, how the proposals which are baked in in legislation and evidenced in this budget will enable students in public schools in those states and that territory to ever reach the schooling resource standard, which is, of course, the cornerstone of the Gonski funding.

I want to briefly talk also about early years, because unfortunately the member for Kingston, the shadow minister, can't be here. Only a few days remain before unfair changes to child care and early years—and I was pleased to hear the assistant minister talk about early years as well as child care. I congratulate her for that. I wish her colleagues, including the Prime Minister, would do the same. But the fact remains that this budget does not acknowledge the benefits of early-years education. We see again only a one-year bandaid when it comes to kindergarten program funding. We see some real problems: 297,000 families will be worse off under these unfair changes. I wonder, in addition to recognising that and then explaining that, can the minister provide an update on the government's readiness for the 2 July rollout of the childcare package? Has all performance testing of the new IT system been completed? Are all 16 software vendors registered? What percentage of centres and providers have registered for the new system? What percentage of families, critically, have registered for the new system, and is this percentage in line with the government's expected registrations? How many families did you, Assistant Minister, plan to have registered at this point?

I wonder also if the minister could deal with deep concerns I have about schools. These concerns go to the question of appropriate funding for students with disability. If disability is a priority, can the minister explain why in the recent report handed down by David Gonski and received by government there is not a single reference to students with disability? It seems to me that that is an omission that needs to be remedied. As the shadow minister made clear, it could be remedied were there an evidence institute as recommended by Mr Gonski and supported and promised to be funded by Labor. But what we have from this government is a mess when it comes to funding for students with disabilities. We have inconsistent advice to government on the NCCD data process. We have inconsistencies and no apparent interest in progressing this. We had in November a statement by the minister advertising that the School Resourcing Board would look at the disability loading in November, but there has been not a single statement by the minister or the board in advancing that. So perhaps the assistant minister can tell us and parents of students with disabilities how this will be rectified.

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