Sharon Bird (Cunningham, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On behalf of the Standing Committee on Education and Training, I present the committee’s report entitled Review of the Department of Education, Science and Training annual report 2006-07, together with the minutes of proceedings and evidence received by the committee.

Ordered that the report be made a parliamentary paper.

On behalf of the Standing Committee on Education and Training and in the presence of my deputy chair, Dr Dennis Jensen, I present the report on the committee’s review of the Department of Education, Science and Training’s annual report for 2006-07. The DEST annual report was tabled in February 2008. Since the 2007 election, portfolio responsibility for education has moved to the new Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations. The committee undertook the review of the annual report in order to acquaint itself with portfolio issues and establish a dialogue with stakeholders.

The report canvassed four areas of interest raised by members of the committee. These were, firstly, the adequacy of skills training to meet emerging demands; secondly, the effectiveness of the Australian qualifications framework; thirdly, the recruitment levels of mature age apprentices; and finally the decline in enrolments in enabling sciences at universities. The first three of these areas refer specifically to the operation of the vocational education and training sector, which is undergoing a period of intense review and significant reform. Indeed, that continued during the time in which the committee was looking at the topic.

A particular challenge to achieving adequate training to meet emerging demands in the VET sector is the development of green skills to promote sustainability principles. Examples of the application of new green skills can be found in areas such as harvesting recycled water, installation of photovoltaic cells and the conversion of cars to run on LPG. In many cases, the evidence before the committee from people such as the industry skills training councils was that the skill sets are not new but that the tradespeople need to learn to apply their existing knowledge in new ways.

Stakeholders identified some positives in the VET sector, such as the ongoing rationalisation of training packages to increase portability of qualifications across industries and indeed even within industries. However, areas of concern remain. Two such areas of concern refer to shortfalls in the number of VET teachers and ensuring qualifications reflect the expectations of trainees and industry employers. With the onset of the global financial crisis and an expected decline in employment vacancies, VET should be focused on having people skilled and ready to participate once the downturn passes. The capacity to get people skilled and ready for work requires adequate numbers of teachers to meet demand. Ensuring the standards of qualifications is also vital to those undertaking training and to future employers. Ensuring quality of skills is reflected in the qualification is particularly important in an environment of increased competition in the VET sector, both domestically and internationally.

Taking into account the review and reform prevailing within the VET sector, the committee has made only one recommendation in this area arising from the report. The current regime of data collection does not require private providers of VET services to supply data. The committee believes that there is a potentially significant gap in information available to government and consideration should be given to requiring the privately registered training organisations to provide relevant data to the National Centre for Vocational Education and Research as a condition of endorsement under the Australian Quality Training Framework.

The committee also inquired into claims that there had been a decline in tertiary enrolments in enabling sciences, that is, the hard science subjects such as maths and physics. I am sure my colleague, the Deputy Chair, will have quite a bit to say on this as he had a particular interest in exploring this area. Statistics from various sources painted quite different pictures of what has been occurring in the science departments of universities. Figures provided by the department indicated little cause for concern, with enrolment levels remaining relatively stable. However, statistics and accounts presented by other stakeholders presented more alarming trends of decline in the enabling science enrolments. Discrepancies between data sets appeared to arise as a result of differing definitions of an enabling science that were used to aggregate data, as well as the time frame chosen to establish the trend in participation. Therefore, we have recommended the department consult with the stakeholders to improve the quality of this data.

I am sure the committee would join me in thanking the secretary of the committee, Glenn Worthington, the inquiry secretaries, Justin Baker and Jane Hearn, and the research officer, Ray Knight for their excellent work in supporting our investigation. I recommend the report.

Dennis Jensen (Tangney, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to commend the report to the House. However, with regret I note that a review of a Commonwealth department’s annual report for the 2006-07 year is only now being tabled just weeks before the 2008-09 year. This two-year gap is unacceptably protracted, and has occurred for reasons I shall explain.

The Department of Science, Education and Training, as it was previously known, tabled its 2006-07 annual report in parliament on 13 February 2008 for reasons best known to the department itself. Consider though, that following the 2007 federal election, the department was disbanded and its responsibilities transferred to the new Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations. The House of Representatives Standing Committee on Education and Training decided on 29 March 2008 to review the annual report, and the document before you today is the result of that 14-month project.

The review highlights unacceptable delays by the department concerned in providing responses to requests for information from the committee. Information requested at the first public hearing on 6 June 2008 was not provided until 20 October, and information requested on 5 February 2009 was not received until 2 April. If a parliamentary committee receives this treatment from the department, what chance does a member of the general public have in obtaining responses within a reasonable time frame?

The review notes that the committee is concerned that Commonwealth departments understand they are ultimately accountable to the people of Australia through the parliament of the people’s representatives. I trust the committee does not experience such tardiness on the part of the department in future. As such, a recommendation was made that the department provides in future annual reports details of the number of questions it receives from parliamentary committees and the time taken to respond to them.

On a positive note, I note that this committee continues to function in the best bipartisan spirit, and the document before you is a fine example of when members from both sides work together for the common good of the people. Although there will inevitably be differences of ideology, opinion and matters of the day, there is no doubt that the committee works for the best outcomes of the nation.

The review focuses on a number of issues I would like to highlight, and one of these in particular is the decline in university enrolments in the enabling sciences. These sciences—chemistry, physics and mathematics—provide the very foundations for innovation and development of technical expertise. The year 2006-07 saw a decline in undergraduate enrolments in all enabling sciences, most notably in my own field of physics. The fall in physics and astronomy enrolments for the year was 11.4 per cent. Thankfully, the number of postgraduate enrolments for enabling sciences was slightly up for the year and only down marginally at 0.2 per cent for physics and astronomy.

The figures for the year bucked a more positive trend in this field over the preceding five years. But the committee was told enabling science enrolments had been in steady decline over the longer term from 1989. The number of mathematical sciences students dived 33.7 per cent from 1989 to 2005, with physical sciences dropping 19.4 per cent over the same period. The number of chemical sciences students fell by 5.3 per cent. Making these figures even more disturbing is the fact that they are based simply on the numbers of students enrolled in particular courses, and make no allowance for the rapid population growth in that same period or the increasing percentage of people pursuing tertiary education. Reasons for these changing trends are varied, but appear to include both a lack of interest among high school students and a lack of quality science teachers at high school. It is very much a chicken-and-egg question: which came first—the lack of interest or the lack of good teachers?

The review details some suggestions for increasing enrolments in the enabling sciences, and I urge the government to implement some of the suggestions raised. There was some disagreement on interpreting enrolments data. The committee agreed that studies in these enabling sciences must be encouraged with initiatives commencing at the high school level at least. The sciences offer varied and rewarding career paths. They are rewarding to the individuals concerned and Australia as a whole. We cannot afford to neglect them. I commend the report to the House.