Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

by leave—I move opposition amendments (1) to (3):

(1)    Clause 15, page 20 (lines 4-8), omit paragraph (c), substitute:

             (c)    if a law of the Commonwealth or a State requires the body or authority to be audited - the relevant audit expresses concern about the financial viability of the body or authority.

(2)    Clause 22, page 25 (lines 3-11), omit the clause.

(3)    Clause 24, page 26 (lines 5-16), omit subclause (1), substitute:

        (1)    A funding agreement must require the relevant authority for the non-government school, or other non-government body, to ensure that a report (or reports), of a kind (or kinds) required by the Minister, is given to the Minister in relation to programs of financial assistance provided under this Act, so far as they relate to the relevant authority.

It is not the intention of the opposition to unnecessarily delay the passage of this bill through the Senate. Nor is it our intention to stop the bill from having its effect from 1 January, but it certainly is our intention to hold fast to these three amendments, which will improve an otherwise flawed bill. We would hope that the government would seriously consider adopting the three amendments that the opposition has moved. They deal with proposed sections 15, 22 and 24 of the bill.

I will start with section 24, which relates to funding disclosure. The bill marks a very considered change from the policy of the previous government with respect to funding disclosure. The Minister for Education pointed out quite correctly in the debate that the financial statements required by non-government schools at the moment do require a certain level of funding disclosure. They are made available to the minister, and therefore the department, as part of the records of the school and they do go some way towards providing quite detailed financial information. This bill, however, which requires the disclosure of all funding sources from the school or any body associated with the school, would allow for the publication of that information. This is a critical change and is the hidden agenda contained in this bill.

We all know that the minister and most members of the Labor Party privately oppose the socioeconomic status model of funding for non-government schools. They are on the record opposing it. They opposed it as recently as 2004, when they introduced their own new policy, which was the national resource index. They oppose the SES model because they do not in their heart of hearts really support government funding for non-government schools. During the previous government, the information that was available to the government about the funding sources of non-government schools was never published. Under this government, that information would be published—the minister confirmed that in the second reading debate. It neatly ties in with the review being planned for 2010 of the SES model for non-government schools.

Blind Freddy could tell you that the government, and its fellow travellers in the Australian Education Union and elsewhere amongst the left-wing ideologues who have opposed the SES model, will use this information about non-government schools to mount a case and an argument against the SES model—to throw the model out and replace it with a national resource index. Non-government schools should be very, very afraid of this information being in the hands of the Labor Party. They had no fear from us, but the hidden agenda in the Labor Party’s bill is to take the SES model apart. The member for Throsby alluded to it. Julia Irwin, the member for Fowler, alluded to it in her speech. So our most important amendment is to remove the funding disclosure requirement for publication contained in this bill.

Secondly, the bill contains a mandated national curriculum. The opposition support a national curriculum but we do not support what this bill requires, which is an inflexible, mandated national curriculum which puts at risk the Steiner, Montessori, International Baccalaureate, special needs schools which care for those people who have special needs and other schools that have a unique curriculum. How does the curriculum of those unique schools fit into the mandated, inflexible national curriculum that is tied to funding contained in this bill? That has not been cleared up by the government in this debate and it should strike fear into the hearts of the principals and governing bodies of those kinds of unique schools.

Finally, this bill allows the minister to delay or stop funding to a school that has received a qualified audit on grounds other than financial viability. That is a change in this bill that has never been seen before under the previous government. If an auditor qualifies an audit for governance reasons that have nothing to do with financial viability, it puts the power in the hands of the minister to delay or reject funding for that school. That is a new and far-reaching power which the opposition says should be removed from this bill. For that reason, I call on the government to support the amendments that the opposition has moved.

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to oppose the amendments moved by the shadow minister for education. I would have to say that when the show The X Files was on TV, I was a fan of it. The difference between me and the shadow minister for education is that he is suffering a delusion that he is in it. He is seeing conspiracy theories everywhere, spun out of the air, and hidden agendas. That is what these amendments are directed to—not the facts and not anything that is about a child’s education but, rather, a conspiracy theory.

Why is the shadow minister engaged in a conspiracy theory? Well, better for the shadow minister from the Liberal Party to be engaged in a conspiracy theory about the future than to try and defend the shameful legacy that the Howard government left to this nation in education: declining standards against our competitors, as revealed by international testing; no national curriculum; no transparency; no action on teacher quality; and children not learning with the learning tools of the 21st century like computers. It is a shameful record and I can understand why the shadow minister for education is trying to weave a conspiracy theory out of thin air to try and cover up that legacy of neglect, decline and decay that characterised the Liberal Party in government.

Let us just look at the facts as opposed to the shadow minister’s conspiracy theory. The facts are simply these: the government are committed to a new era of transparency. Yes, it will include transparency about funding sources; and, as the government have made absolutely clear, every condition we put on non-government schools we will also apply to government schools. The same transparency framework will apply. This will enable people to understand across the nation for the first time what is happening in Australian schools. We understand that the Liberal Party was a complete failure when it comes to transparency. Apparently that record of failure has now morphed into a policy position of opposition. We believe in being honest with the Australian people. We will ensure that there is a transparency framework which applies equally to government and non-government schools.

On the question of the national curriculum, yes, the Liberal Party members should be hanging their heads in shame because of their lack of action on the national curriculum. Of course for the Liberal Party the curriculum was never about the quality of a child’s learning; it was all about whether or not they could get their name in the headlines of the newspapers. It was all about whether or not they could parade their credentials in the history wars to other Liberal Party members. Their intervention in curriculum debates was all about themselves and all about the political positioning of the Liberal Party. The one thing it was never about was the quality of education in Australian schools.

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You put Stuart Macintyre in charge of the history curriculum.

Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The shadow minister is interjecting about the history curriculum now. Perhaps he wants to explain to the Australian people why, after 12 long years and a rainforest worth of broadsheet newspaper columns about the history wars, the record of the Liberal Party in government is that 50 per cent of children in secondary schools do not learn any history. That was your legacy. All of those articles in the Australian newspaper and all of the history wars nonsense they went on about was all ‘look at me’ politics—it was all about the Liberal Party and nothing to do with the quality of kids’ education.

We will have a national curriculum. It will have local flexibility, and of course in giving local flexibility we will be working with those who offer curriculum like the International Baccalaureate. Finally, the provision about accounts is one that the shadow minister is trying to create a fear campaign about. It is a simple provision, a probity provision. If accounts are qualified then of course a minister would have a look, and that is what the act provides. These are very simple provisions. Of course he will be there beating the fear drum. No-one in the sector should believe him. This is about cheap and petty politics to cover up 12 years of neglect.

Question put:

That the amendments (Mr Pyne’s) be agreed to.