Jodie Belyea (Dunkley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I'm very pleased to be speaking on the Better and Fairer Schools (Information Management) Bill 2024. This bill has been a long time coming. My colleague and friend the member for Lalor has been advocating for these reforms since 2009. She was a principal in schools in Victoria, and I appreciate the example she's recently shared of why this bill is so important and her advocacy on the need for a unique student identifier.

The bill may sound a little bland, but this is a really important issue to address. It centres around the unique student identifier that our students have. Essentially, the USI is a reference number made up of 10 numbers and letters. Basically, if you are a new or continuing student undertaking a nationally recognised or state qualification, a student in the Commonwealth, you need a USI.

I'll start with a little history about the bill. Back in 2009, before it was dissolved, the Council of Australian Governments—COAG—set out to create a national unique identifier that could be used to track students as they progressed through education and training. This was important for the higher education and vocational education and training, or VET, experience of students. While good progress was made on the USI for VET and higher education, it has taken until now for it to be extended to school students.

With this bill, we will be expanding the USI system from VET and higher education to primary school students. Students will have a unique identifier that they will take with them throughout their education journey, not just through higher education as is the status quo. Secondary and primary school students will have one as well. It actually boggles the mind why this was not done in the first place. Anyway, it's the last national policy initiative to be delivered under the current schools agreement.

What does this bill do? The bill itself is very simple. It makes the necessary technical changes. But I digress. It will allow the Student Identifiers Registrar, a statutory body under the Student Identifiers Act 2014, to assign school identifiers. Then, in turn, the schools will apply for school identifiers on behalf of their students. It will also empower the registrar to assign, validate and revoke student identifiers. It authorises the registrar to use or disclose information for research purposes that meet requirements set by all education ministers. Importantly, it will give the Minister for Education the necessary authority to recommend to the Governor-General the making of regulations under the act. The next steps on how to harness the potential of the schools USI system will be a matter for discussion between the Commonwealth, states and territories, and it is subject to agreement at the education ministers meeting.

Most importantly, what this bill will do is ensure that we can keep an eye on our children and young people who are vulnerable, so we know they are at school or when they move, because participating in school and other education is an important safety net for the most vulnerable young people. Getting an education is a protective factor that enables children and young people to break the cycle of poverty and disadvantage.

Privacy of information, as we all know so well, is incredibly important. This bill will protect privacy. There is nothing more important than safeguarding information about our children and teenagers. There are strong privacy protections in the bill. The bill introduces the concept of protected information into the act, which includes student identifiers, schools identifiers and school identity management information. The information is subject to strict legislative restrictions on the collection, use and disclosure of information. Information collected by the registrar is subject to the Privacy Act 1988. State and territory privacy legislation will also apply to schools identifier information. Education ministers have agreed to allow a student's schools identifier to travel with them when they move from one school, from one school system or from one jurisdiction to another, supporting the robust and timely transfer of a student's information as they move from one school to another.

There are some future uses that could be considered for this bill. One is helping ensure that students are not falling through the cracks, by supporting jurisdictions to monitor when they leave one school and don't enrol in another. There are future opportunities to connect the USI to NAPLAN so that parents and teachers can have ready access to the progress of their children over time. This information will be at their fingertips. Building our understanding of student pathways means we can better target and provide support to students and schools. Having a USI will enable more sophisticated data linkage and analysis to improve our understanding of student growth, progression and pathways. All future uses of the schools USI need to be agreed to by all education ministers through discussion.

The bill is backed by major reviews. The schools USI has had the backing of major reviews: the Review to Achieve Educational Excellence in Australian Schools, the Productivity Commission inquiry into education and the Education Council's STEM Partnerships Forum. These reports made the case that the USI is needed to drive consistency in data collection; to maximise learning growth, supporting the individual learning needs of students; to underpin innovation and continuous improvement; to improve our understanding of student pathways into school and beyond; and to track individual student performance.

This is the last national policy initiative to be delivered under the current schools agreement originally signed under the former government. I urge the coalition to continue its commitment to this policy and ensure that this bill enjoys bipartisan support.

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