Michael Ferguson (Bass, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the House:

(1)

notes as unacceptable Australia having eight different, and often inconsistent, sets of school curriculum;

(2)

calls on the Commonwealth to work cooperatively with the State and Territory governments for greater consistency in both school curricula and standards for every Australian school student; and

(3)

supports initiatives which will improve the education standards and accountability of educational authorities across the country, both government and non-government.

I believe that Australian governments of all political leanings should now focus intensely on the needs and best interests of our nation’s education system. This is the place of nurture and preparation for a lifetime of experiences and, hopefully, lifelong further learning. We as a country have much to be proud of in our education system.  Recent achievements include: record levels of Commonwealth funding to all schools, while supporting parent choice; much-needed reforms to higher education; proper recognition of adult and vocational education; and support for values, literacy and numeracy, plain-English reporting and greater physical activity.

This is very admirable. However, in my view, this parliament needs to take the lead to forge a better standard for our school education system. There is widespread community concern about the content and standard of curriculum being developed and delivered by the various education authorities around Australia. Our nation of just 20 million people suffers from having eight separate sets of curriculum and, to different degrees, fads within systems that teachers, parents and students feel dissatisfied with.

As a former teacher, I am able to say from experience that students who move between states really do struggle to fit in; indeed, some students who move between schools within one state may feel lost in the wilderness as there is no common base curriculum, in terms of actual content or outcomes, either between states or, amazingly, within them.

We need to work to facilitate student mobility around Australia because there is a lack of transparency in curriculum about the specific details of what students need to know. It ought to trouble any parent that their child can graduate from grade 6 without knowing their multiplication tables; it should make them angry that their child can graduate from grade 10 without knowing them. Clearly, this in itself is no proof that there is a need for change, but it is very compelling evidence indeed.

In my state of Tasmania, enormously expensive changes have been made to a new curriculum called the ‘New Essential Learnings’, which has proved to be a disaster and has had to undergo serious repairs even within these early days of its implementation. Even now, there is every prospect that students from different schools within Tasmania will be exposed to an entirely distinct school curriculum assessed against discrete local standards—or lack of them.

The education needs of students are not unique to particular states or regions. Our students need to be equipped with the fundamentals: the enduring skills and learning that will help to make them more informed and productive citizens. These needs are not unique to particular areas or jurisdictions; they are common across the country. The application of different education philosophies around the country contributes to a situation whereby students studying supposedly similar subjects may be exposed to quite different approaches to texts, ideas and social issues. Worse than this, there is some evidence of politically partisan curricula and behaviour in a small number of schools.

With this in mind, it is important that responsibility is taken to ensure that authorities in both government and non-government schools are held accountable in their role of improving and implementing education standards. A recent survey by Roy Morgan Research shows that 69 per cent of Australians do want a national curriculum. The neo-dinosaurs in the ALP are therefore swimming against the tide of much-needed reform. The Australian Science Teachers Association declared its support for a national year 12 science curriculum because in some states ‘science curriculum is a mile wide and just one inch deep’. From comments like this, it is clear that the wider community and the professional community are demanding an end to fads and a return to common-sense curricula with agreed core subjects and a renewed focus on literacy and numeracy.

The Commonwealth government needs to take a co-operative leadership role in its drive for a back-to-basics approach to ensure that we have greater national consistency and, importantly, greater accountability.  All of this can and must be achieved cooperatively with state governments and non-government school authorities by improving standards from mediocrity to excellence, by supporting students with special needs, and by an additional special focus on ensuring that Australian school graduates are the world’s best.

Ian Causley (Page, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the motion seconded?

Kerry Bartlett (Macquarie, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the motion and reserve my right to speak.

Brendan O'Connor (Gorton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the motion moved by the member for Bass. Having listened to the member for Bass, I would have to say that if one were to mark his contribution today he would get zero out of 10 because he was plagiarising. He was plagiarising the Minister for Education, Science and Training’s contribution of three weeks ago when she sought to rail against the state and territory authorities, whom she claims are not providing proper education services to children in this country. I think it is fair to say that this motion arises out of the Howard government’s intent to centralise school curricula in its own image. But, firstly, I will outline my support for the second paragraph of the motion, calling:

... on the Commonwealth to work cooperatively with the State and Territory governments for greater consistency in both school curricula and standards for every ... school student ...

Where it is both appropriate and feasible, there should be greater federal corporation in areas of public policy, including the education of our students. To that extent I accept that part of the motion moved by the member for Bass. If there are areas which can be improved, areas where there are inconsistencies that should not exist or where there is not a capacity for education to be portable across the state boundaries of this nation, then clearly one should move in that direction. But it might well be the case, however, that we should also consider the different needs in different parts of the nation. It is not so much a matter of different standards as of accepting the different peculiarities of and perhaps different emphases in what each state is doing. So there should at least be some recognition that there would be differences across what is a very large nation.

One has to question the sincerity and intent behind this motion given that it follows the commentary by the federal minister for education. Three weeks ago the minister launched an attack on the curricula of state and territory education departments. The minister’s original speech, which was doctored prior to delivery, accused the states of teaching themes which come ‘straight from Chairman Mao’. One has to ask whose cultural revolution the minister was helping to impose upon the schoolchildren of Australia. Lacking any sense of irony, in one breath the minister concocted the notion that our schools are in the grip of Maoism and in the other outlined her plans to centralise our education system.

It would appear that the ambitions of the Howard government have no bounds. Once a devout federalist, the Prime Minister, since obtaining a Senate majority, has set about getting his hands upon everything within his reach. We must ask ourselves: why should a political party that once eschewed centralism seek to wrench these matters from the states and territories? The answer lies in part, in my view, in the government’s ambition to impose its ideological views upon all areas of our society. The Prime Minister sees himself as a cultural warrior in a cultural war, and it would appear that the school system is to be his next conquest. If the government wanted to assist students in my electorate, it would ensure that Commonwealth expenditure for schools is determined on a needs basis.

As for the minister for education’s view that students are brainwashed by left-wing ideologues, I see none of that. That is not to say that schoolteachers themselves would not have particular views. The member for Bass talked about the existence of partisan teaching. I accept that there would be examples of partisan teaching, but I would have to say that that partisanship would come from more than one spectrum of our society. It should not be acceptable, but to believe, as the minister for education would have us believe, that there is some systemic partisanship across our education system is indeed false. I cannot imagine, for example, the member for Bass, in his years as a secondary schoolteacher, asking his class to critique Shakespeare from a Marxist perspective. But what if he did? If our youth could even tell me who Marx was I would say that was a triumph of the education system. Why not get them to critique Marx? Better still, get them to read Adam Smith, Milton Friedman, John Maynard Keynes and John Kenneth Galbraith. I support this motion insofar as it encourages cooperative federalism. But this motion seems to be dogwhistling to society: it is attempting to suggest that each teacher in school has an agenda that is against this government when in fact I would rather trust the teachers of this nation and the other governments of this nation in the way in which— (Time expired)

Kerry Bartlett (Macquarie, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On most international comparisons the education that our children receive in Australian schools is of a very high standard. But this is no reason for complacency or for inaction in the face of some clearly identified issues. The first of these is the need for national consistency in terms of curricula, starting and finishing ages, qualifications and tertiary entrance. It is ridiculous in a time of such geographic mobility, both real and virtual, that we have eight different sets of curricula, five different starting ages and nine different year 12 qualifications and standards. These create significant hardship for families who are required to move interstate. As I have a large RAAF base in my electorate, I am very familiar with the difficulties created for a number of families when unexpected postings severely disrupt their children’s education. It is not uncommon for the officer being relocated to leave his or her family behind because of the incompatibility of senior curricula and a reluctance to interrupt the final years of their son’s or daughter’s education. In a situation where each year the number of students transferring interstate is roughly equivalent to the entire Tasmanian school population, it is simply unacceptable that there is not a common curriculum and that this process of movement is not made as seamless as possible.

Secondly, there is a need to ensure that, in the process of bringing in some degree of standardisation or uniformity, there is a clear commitment to ensuring the highest possible standards to ensure that our young people are equipped with the knowledge and skills which best allow them to develop their potential and which best equip them to be productive participants in the life of our community. We need to make sure that the record level of resources that the federal government is putting into education is used effectively in this regard.

It seems to me that two things are required. The first is restoring a focus on the fundamentals of literacy, of numeracy, of science and of Australian history. We need to ensure that the highest possible standards are achieved in all disciplines. Secondly, we need to ensure that our curricula are not dumbed down to the lowest common denominator, as sadly happens at times, to make them more widely acceptable. We see this particularly in the areas of literacy and numeracy, and perhaps also in the area of science. As the President of the Australian Science Teachers Association said recently, in supporting a national year-12 science curriculum, ‘In some states science our curriculum is a mile wide and an inch deep.’

Too often as well we have a situation where the curriculum has been compromised to follow the latest ideological fashions. For example, the trendy deconstruction of classics in literature according to ideological issues, rather than through an examination of their literary merit, is far too common.

Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern Australia and Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Oh!

Kerry Bartlett (Macquarie, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I notice people on the other side shaking their heads. As the Head of the School of Humanities at the ANU, Dr Simon Haines, said, we should ‘make it a literature course, not a disguised political science course’. There are places for political science. Literature should be about studying literature, science should be about studying science and history should be about studying history, not de facto ways of introducing ideological preconceptions.

We see it too often. In February last year, as reported in the Australian, we had Wayne Sawyer, the President of the New South Wales English Teachers Association, blaming the teaching profession for allowing the re-election of the Howard government because they had not been so ideologically effective as to prevent people voting for the Howard government. Then in 2004, at an Australian Education Union conference, we had a principal of a senior Western Australian high school arguing that the new three Rs in education ought to be reconciliation, refugees and republic. Those things might be commendable, but that is not the main reason parents send their children to school. The three Rs that parents want to see are reading, writing and arithmetic, and they want to see the focus on those fundamentals.

There are a multitude of other examples that could be cited. The point is this: the focus must be on academic rigour, not on political correctness. The focus must be on building knowledge and skills, not on promoting ideological agendas. Thirdly, we need to ensure that we are rewarding adequately those teachers who are doing their best in commitment and effort in teaching our young people. (Time expired)

Julie Owens (Parramatta, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Public education is one of the foundation stones of our society; it provides our children with the basic entry to a good life and a prosperous future. So it saddens me to hear government members once again speaking about education as if they were in the opposition. We in the opposition often take the role of saying, ‘We should do this; we should do that.’ That is one of the roles of the opposition. We are not in government and we do not have the power—particularly now that the government has control of the Senate—to have significant daily influence in the way our education system is run. But ‘we should’ is not a role that governments play. Perhaps they do in their first year, but not in their 10th year.

We ‘should’ now focus on the quality of education, says the member for Bass. We ‘should’ now take a cooperative approach, says the member for Bass, confirming what we on this side have known for at least the last 10 years—that for 10 years this government has not done that. Governments should not be playing ‘we should’. They actually have the power. The member for Bass is one of the most powerful men in the country when it comes to public education, one of only a few hundred who have the kind of power that he has. Governments should be saying, ‘We have done this,’ after 10 years of government and, ‘We are here now, this can be better and we are doing this.’ Government members should not be calling on themselves to do better; they should just be doing better.

They shoulda’ done it but they didn’t. They shoulda’ done it because they had the power and the money. They coulda’ done it because they had the power and the money. They probably woulda’ done it if they had Liberal state governments, but they like bagging the Labor ones too much. They shoulda’, they coulda’, they woulda’ but they didn’t—and 10 years later they are saying, ‘Now we should do it.’ They should have done it 10 years ago. It is not good enough and it makes me, not just parents, angry when the member for Bass stands there and says that a graduate from grade 10 does not know the multiplication tables. Last year I heard Brendan Nelson, at the time the Minister for Education, Science and Training, saying that 15-year-olds could not read. When this government came to power 10 years ago those kids were five. They were in grade 1 when this government came to power. If,10 years later, they still cannot read and they still do not know the multiplication tables, it is about time the government accepted some responsibility for that. Who does the member for Bass think he is, 10 years later, to walk into this place and say that we should now do something?

Children’s lives do not wait for you. They do not wait one year. Ask any parent out there who has a child who needs a teacher’s aid in their classroom because they are having learning difficulties. Ask any parent whose child comes home every day thinking that they are just not very smart because they are having trouble reading in their first year of school. Ask any parent and they will tell you a child’s life does not wait one year. It sure as hell does not wait 10 years—and by the time we come to the election next year it will be 12 years; it will be one child’s entire school life under the responsibility of this federal government. So do not come in here 10 years later and say we should now do something, without at least acknowledging that for 10 years you have not done it.

The member for Bass now calls on the Commonwealth to work cooperatively with the states. We know that this government does not play well with others—we have watched them for 10 years. That is what this government’s report card would say: ‘Did not try on education; does not work well with others.’ When it comes to the state governments, this government—quite recently, in the field of education—takes great pleasure in standing up in this House and pretending to be the state opposition. Never mind its role as the federal government, an extremely important role—indeed, one of the most important roles you can have when it comes to public education—it stands in this House and pretends to be the state opposition.

This government takes every opportunity to bag the states. It was doing it last year. It bags teachers. It bags public education. It takes every opportunity to get front-page stories about how poor our public education system is, when those on this side of the House know exactly how good it is. Go to your local schools, members on the government side, and have a look at the work that they do.

Government members now sit here and say: ‘It is important that all governments take responsibility. It is important that all governments work cooperatively.’ I say to them:  ‘Look to yourselves. Before you start calling on everybody else to do it, try and do it yourselves. You have had 10 years to work with the state governments. If you still cannot do it, if you still cannot work with the elected representatives of the states— (Time expired)

John Forrest (Mallee, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am pleased that the member for Parramatta finally got to the real issue here—that is, in accordance with our Constitution, states run the education system. But this is a good resolution and I commend the member for Bass for bringing it to the House’s attention. We are talking about those who are the future of the nation and the best investment we can possibly make is to ensure they get first-class, world-benchmarked education.

Other speakers have spoken about literature and English, but my real concern is science. The minister has provided me with a whole range of letters—de-identified letters—that she has received in response to her recent initiatives. This is an extract from a letter from a Victorian parent, and I suspect I know who that is because I have received similar letters. There is widespread community concern about the lack of consistency in national standards. This writer says:

My daughter attends a state school in Victoria in year 8. Next year, she will have maths and science combined in one subject. This is called a ‘progressive curriculum’ in Victoria, and I am outraged by it.

I, similarly, am outraged. When I was at school I just loved the maths and I loved the science, but they were distinctly different subjects. That is just another example that I would give of the fads that seem to be the course of our education system. The community is demanding an end to these fads, and that we stick with consistency and rigorous standards. The nation desperately needs the mathematicians who eventually emerge as engineers. It definitely needs scientists who can investigate and research pure science. People need to understand that these are distinctly different subjects and not one and the same.

The community is also concerned about literacy and numeracy, and other speakers have drawn attention to that. But it is an indictment on us as a nation that there are currently eight separate curricula, nine separate year 12 certificates and five different eligible school starting ages. The opposition members have argued that this is the government’s fault after being 10 years in government. But I have been here a long time—I note the member for Parramatta has only recently arrived—and I can remember the efforts by former ministers. There was Minister Kemp, followed by Minister Nelson and now there is Minister Bishop, trying to work with the states to hear the community concern that is rising consistently.

The member for Macquarie makes a very valid point about how mobile our communities are—especially those in rural Australia—and the complaint about different standards across the board. I represent an electorate that has about 1,500 kilometres of state borders, half with South Australia and the other half along the Murray River in New South Wales. Communities’ members are moving, because of jobs and so forth, and it alarms parents to realise that their children have to endure different standards—sometimes the standards are lower; thankfully, sometimes they are higher, but there is just no consistency.

That is what this resolution is calling for and I am confident that the Howard-Vaile government is committed to raising academic standards across our nation—contrary to the member for Parramatta’s contribution. We have seen some progress on this matter. But I am embarrassed by any international benchmarking standard which shows that 30 per cent of Australian students did not reach the basic standard of literacy that would be required to meet the demands of lifelong learning in a rapidly changing knowledge-intensive society.

So this is a good resolution. I continue to naively hope that one day this chamber will unite in the way it presents itself. This is not an opportunity for playing politics. It is not an opportunity for laying blame. It is an opportunity to urge both the Commonwealth and state governments to continue to work together so that we can invest where we should invest—in the future of our most precious resource, our young Australians.

Michael Hatton (Blaxland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

With the exception of the member for Forrest—whose heart is good and in the right place, and who has taken this particular motion and understood it, and understood the problems we have—being lectured by the government about education is like being lectured by Family First on the issue of power in the media. There is no understanding whatsoever of the fact that with power there is also responsibility.

In the past 10 years this government should have done something to fix the fundamental problems that we have—of eight jurisdictions and nine different qualifications at the level of the HSC. I know that John Dawkins started the process of trying to get national profiles and national standards, of trying to allow one child in Western Australia to have their school qualifications recognised in New South Wales and to have teacher qualifications in New South Wales recognised in South Australia. We are looking at two decades—half Labor, half Liberal. We are looking at a problem that that has been addressed in such a manner that the approach that has been taken has been glacial. And a core part of that problem has been the innate nature of a lot of the siloed education departments Australia wide. It would take a government committed to fixing the problem to address that, though. In 2006, we have not only teachers and their qualifications not recognised Australia wide, with a process that started over 20 years ago, but also our students are without common curricula Australia wide. Those are fundamental things that should be focused on.

What are the government members, with the exception of the member for Forrest, doing? What we have heard is claptrap. What we have had is the government’s culture wars. What we have is an attempt simply to use some straw figures and argue for a particular value-laden approach to these things. That will not help a kid from Western Australia to come to Sydney and have their educational qualifications recognised, and it will not help a teacher from Queensland in being able to walk into a school in Tasmania or one of the other states and easily be able to practise. Good government is about putting effort into doing good and proper things; this government has not done that for 10 years. The great speech from the member for Parramatta proved that. This government needs to be condemned in this regard.

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! It being 1.45 pm, the debate is interrupted in accordance with standing order 34. The debate may be resumed at a later hour and the member will have leave to continue speaking when the debate is resumed.