Lisa Chesters (Bendigo, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in favour of the Better and Fairer Schools (Funding and Reform) Bill 2024, but I also have an ask. As I stand here, my daughter Daisy is in her first transition session to her new primary school. I will acknowledge that I have locked in a FaceTime with Daisy for 10 minutes from now to see how it went. Daisy and some of her kindergarten friends have started their transition program for Camp Hill Primary School, a public school in the heart of Bendigo. We are quite spoilt for choice in Bendigo in terms of our big network of independent, Catholic and public schools. But Daisy and her kindergarten friends are not alone. Sixty per cent of her kindergarten class will go to public schools in our area. What frustrates me the most as I stand here to speak on this bill is that those children—all children going to public schools—will not receive 100 per cent of the resource standard. The children in her class going to Catholic and independent schools will.

I think about the journey that so many families are going on—those anxious times when their little ones start to enter primary school. It is a big transition moment not just for the children but for their families. That that school is not going to get the same resources as the other kindergarten children going to independent and Catholic schools is unfair. I say this with an ask to all of us in this place and to our colleagues and state governments: that is on us. We cannot hide behind the rhetoric that it is a Liberal government holding back our schools and that will not fund them properly. It is on us. Within my speech, I'd like to make and ask of and to encourage our Labor ministers at a state and federal level to work this one out. We know that this system is unfair. We know that our public schools are receiving less money than they should. If we want to live up to the ideal that every school student gets 100 per cent of the resource standard, and that it is not your postcode that determines your school and education outcome, then we have to get this right.

I do speak in favour of this bill, because it does allow the Commonwealth to deliver more funding to public schools. It also puts protections in place to ensure the Commonwealth gets its fair share of public school funding and that it can't go backward. It introduces a floor of 20 per cent for that and allows the government to negotiate each individual arrangement in each of the states to deliver the funding. I do believe that the Minister for Education in our government is genuine and in there fighting to ensure that we get the resources needed for our public schools. To ensure that every kid has access to the resources that they need to be successful, our schools need this funding. It is critical. It is critical for schools that might have a big make-up of children from a low socio-economic background, students from culturally diverse backgrounds and students with a disability that these schools get this funding.

It's also about ensuring that the school has the resources to deliver not just the basics but the extracurricular activities that keep kids engaged. We all have those experience of going out to primary and secondary schools and seeing how independent schools can put on great, grand school productions, while the public school up the road, because of the funding they receive and the demographic make-up of their students, just don't have the capacity to put on those productions. Productions are just one example of the inequity that exists within our schools. There's the ability to retain teachers, to have up-to-date equipment and to ensure they have support structures in place.

School funding is critical. It isn't just an impact that happens today. It becomes a legacy issue. You could trace the challenges that we have with school funding back to the Howard era and the divergence that we saw happen within our education system. We are unfortunately seeing an increased bleed of students from the public system to the independent and Catholic systems when they get to the secondary school level, and I've noticed that in my own electorate. That is why this bill is so critical. It's about putting a line in the sand and saying that this is the new floor and we hope to work it out to get the extra funding flowing to our schools.

The Australian government is committed to working with the states and territories to ensure that every school is on the path to 100 per cent. The Schooling Resource Standard is a fair funding level, recommended by Gonski all those years ago. It allows the government to negotiate a better, fairer funding agreement with each of our states. We know that there are agreements that have been reached with the Northern Territory, Tasmania and WA. And, yes, I appreciate that the bigger states with higher students numbers—Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria—are still to go. I strongly urge all governments to get together to work this one out.

If all states agree, this equates to an additional $16 billion, from the Australian government alone, to go into schools. It represents the biggest investment in public education by the Australian government in its history. The bill before us amends the Australian Education Act 2013, to enable these funding arrangements to occur.

I want to take a moment to acknowledge the schools in my electorate. Being a regional electorate, I have lots schools, from very large schools to quite small schools. There is Bendigo Senior Secondary College, for years 11 and 12, the largest provider of VCE in Victoria. Last Thursday, it had the biggest cohort of students in the state of Victoria sitting the English exam. From the largest to the very smallest of schools, Langley, a primary school which has three students, there are great public schools with a fantastic teaching network trying doing what they can. I know that, with his extra funding, they'll be able to support all students achieve an outcome.

Having the resources, one of the things that you can do is be able to run a program like the NETschool program, which a senior secondary school does. For students who've disengaged, are at risk of dropping out or have dropped out, the school gets them together off-site from the main senior secondary campus and runs a program that re-engages through art, sport and other activities. It is literally a 'net' school that captures kids falling through the holes—the gaps. It's a model that works but is only possible to be funded, the school says to me, because they have a large student cohort. Funding, by getting to the resource standard of 100 per cent, guarantees that they will always have the resources to keep such a program going. They say that they save lives. I believe they are also helping us to stop the statistic of one in five adult Australians not having the numeracy, literacy and life skills required to work in this country. This school helps children transition to a career, whether it be at TAFE, back into VCE or into work. It's a model that works and other schools could roll out something similar, if they had the resources.

This legislation helps all of our small regional country schools who have smaller student numbers. An increased resource standard means that they have more money in their budget. They don't have to make that choice between an art class or garden program; they have the ability to do both. They don't have to rely on donations for pencils or paper to do their art classes or other classes. These are the types of differences this makes.

We have an amazing network of Catholic and Independent schools in my electorate. When I've spoken to Sandhurst Catholic education department as well as my independent schools, they agree with this legislation. They too want to see all schools get to that 100 per cent resource standard. They don't want to see the competition that's in place, because they see the importance of having well-funded public schools in our area.

This bill is critical to ensure the investment required for our public schools for every student, not just Daisy, my daughter, and the next generation of young primary school students, but for every primary and secondary student currently studying in our public school system and every future student going into our system. This bill delivers for regional schools. It will deliver for Victorian schools. But, again, in my closing remarks I will say that it's up to us—and I really call upon our education ministers—to work this one out.

Sitting suspended from 13:00 to 16:00

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