Danna Vale (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Speaker has received a letter from the honourable member for Sturt proposing that a definite matter of public importance be submitted to the House for discussion, namely:

The failure of the Government to deliver a real Education Revolution.

I call upon those members who approve of the proposed discussion to rise in their places.

More than the number of members required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

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

I present members of the House with a test. I ask them to tell me what the following people have in common: the Auditor-General; the Australian Education Union; the Australian Secondary Principals Association; the Australian Council of State School Organisations; the Australian Primary Principals Association; the Victorian Principals Association; the New South Wales Teachers Federation; the Federation of Parents and Citizens Associations of New South Wales; the New South Wales Secondary Principals Council; Infrastructure Australia board member Peter Newman; Reed Construction Data, an industry expert on building costs; Henry Grossek, the Principal of Berwick Lodge Primary School in the electorate of the member for La Trobe; Stuart Daly, the Principal of the Oatlands Primary School in Melbourne; the Head of Curtin University School of Education, Jenny Nicol; the President of the New South Wales Aboriginal Education Consultative Group, Cindy Berwick; Institute of Public Affairs research fellow and author Julie Novak; the South Australian Primary Principals Association; Education Strategies director and author Kevin Donnelly; and the opposition. What is it that the House thinks we all have in common? It is a very unusual group of people to be aligned together. I will tell you. What we have in common is a chorus of discontent about the government’s free-falling, failed education revolution.

That chorus of discontent is rising to a roar, but this minister cannot hear it. This minister cannot hear the roar that everyone else in the parliament, both Labor and Liberal, can hear. Labor MPs are getting the same information in their electorate offices about the failure of the education revolution, but this minister cannot hear the chorus of discontent that is rising to a roar in the electorate. She sees no evil about her programs, she hears no evil, she speaks no evil, and she will have no evil spoken about Building the Education Revolution. I have in my hand a full folder of BER bungles that surround the schools stimulus debacle. Almost all of them of course have come through the educationforaustralia.com.au website that we have established. Why? Because the government has gagged the principals and chairmen of governing councils who would like to speak out and cannot do so. Like Marie Antoinette in the French Revolution, this minister says: ‘Let them eat cake. I don’t see their problems.’ So it was no surprise to me that Ross Fitzgerald, in a column in the Australian on Monday, wrote:

Nor does it surprise that the Auditor-General has announced he will be conducting a full investigation into this spending, a humiliation for the Minister only three months into the delivery of her program. If it were anyone else on the Treasury benches in charge of this debacle, their career trajectory would be in serious freefall.

‘If it were anyone else on the Treasury benches’—but not this minister, not this protected species. Joel Fitzgibbon, the former Minister for Defence, must wonder what he needed to do to survive the crisis that engulfed him. As Ross Fitzgerald said of the Minister for Education, she is all style and very little substance—not everyone would agree with that, of course. He said she is long on rhetoric but short on delivery, all foam but no beer. Minister, isn’t that the reality of your handling of the education portfolio in the last two years?

We can legitimately ask: why is the Auditor-General inquiring into the Building the Education Revolution primary schools component? He first conducted a preliminary investigation where he went to the department and asked them a series of questions. He was obviously dissatisfied with the response that he received, so he has launched a full audit under section 15 of the Auditor-General Act 1997. This must be one of the most humiliating debacles for a minister in the government in the last 22 months. The Auditor-General is conducting a full investigation, a full audit, into the Deputy Prime Minister’s handling of Building the Education Revolution, which is supposedly the centrepiece of what this government stands for.

This government was supposed to be the education government. The Prime Minister stood up during the election campaign and waved laptops about and visited TAFE colleges and promised to end Australian technical colleges and establish training centres. This was to be the education government. How embarrassing it is, how humiliating it is, that they have been reduced to a full audit by the Auditor-General of Australia into their handling of the education revolution. The Auditor-General will find a litany of complaints, a litany of failures. I have a few of them here. I will of course hand over to the Auditor-General every bit of information that I have, and I would urge all my colleagues—particularly my Liberal Party and National Party colleagues, who are well aware of the problem—to do the same. The Auditor-General will find a litany of failure, a litany of waste, mismanagement and an incapacity to deliver value for money to taxpayers.

Taxpayers of course welcome spending on school infrastructure. Who would not think that spending on school infrastructure was a positive step forward? Who would not think that our schools should have the best possible infrastructure, if not the best possible teachers and the best possible IT? Of course they should. But taxpayers expect—and we in the opposition expect—that the government will at least try to deliver value for money for taxpayers’ dollars. It is not the government’s money. It is the Australian taxpayers’ money. It is the hard-earned income of the Australian taxpayers, which they hand over to the government and expect it to manage wisely. They would be sorely tested by this government’s performance in education.

The Auditor-General will find skimming by state governments. He will find that the South Australian government cut their school infrastructure budget by 12 per cent this year, as though the state government had achieved all the objectives they needed to in infrastructure. This year, for the first time in many, many, many years in South Australia, the infrastructure budget for schools was cut, by 12 per cent, a very substantial cut. What they have done of course is remove their spending and let the federal taxpayers substitute effort. The federal government said that they would not tolerate the substitution of effort. The opposite has occurred.

The Auditor-General will find profiteering by business. Most of my colleagues would be able to give and have given examples of overinflated contract arrangements, of people increasing what they would usually have charged because they know that the bureaucracy is so desperate to push money out the door. The chief estimator of Reed Construction Data, which is one of the firms at the forefront of building in schools, has been quoted in the media:

Reed’s chief estimator, Gary Thornley, said an average school hall should cost no more than $1000 per square metre to build.

A three-storey office block could be built for the price the government was spending on halls, he said. “I reckon $3m is a really big hit” …

“Even if we went beserk we’d never come up with that figure. Whoever has produced that figure has taken it out of their earlobe. It’s Versace stuff.”

We hope that the minister has not taken it out of her earlobe, but clearly someone in the departments right across Australia is allowing business to get away with profiteering out of the Australian taxpayers’ money.

The Auditor-General will find that the Queensland state government is paying consultants up to $525,000 for six months of work to manage their projects—to manage, apparently, five to 10 schools. It is an exorbitant amount of money that the Queensland state government is flushing out into the system. Of course, the consultants are deeply into the trough. They have got their snouts deep in the trough. They are getting right into the trough and lolling about in taxpayers’ very satisfying and relaxing money.

The Auditor-General will also find, as was revealed by the Australian on Saturday, examples like X-site, a small business, a small building firm, trying to garner some of the money from the Building the Education Revolution program and get some jobs. The head of X-site, Mr Lester, was quoted in relation to trying to fulfil the bewildering array of conditions that the government has applied to this:

“It’s tough, and it’s expensive,” Mr Lester said.

“You basically have to employ somebody to tell you that you’re abiding by the standard.

“That means you’ve got to get a consultant, which is going to cost us about $10,000, to dot the Is and cross the Ts.

“It will cost several thousand more to get certified. But you have to do it, otherwise you miss the boat, and it’s expensive because you have to pay somebody just to tell you that you’ve met the standard.”

Of course, for the Labor Party $10,000 is a mere bagatelle, $10,000 is nothing. But, for small businesses and small building firms, $10,000 is a very substantial amount of money and it is straight out of their bottom line, straight out of their profits, straight out of their capacity to employ people, to employ other Australians.

Andrew Laming (Bowman, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Laming interjecting

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

Exactly! Ten thousand dollars would not even pay for a free lunch with Anna Bligh or any of the Queensland ministers at one of their fundraisers. But this Mr Lester has to find $10,000, as he says, just to prove that he is abiding by the standard that he is already abiding by.

We have good examples like that from my good friend and colleague the member for Kalgoorlie of Perenjori Primary School, where he shows that there have been overinflated costs—an amazing inflation from $527,000 to $950,000 in two months. What does the minister say about that? She cannot hear it. There is nothing wrong with her scheme, nothing wrong with her programs. The minister never makes a mistake. We saw on Q&A the other night, with the young audience, that the minister never makes a mistake. It is always somebody else’s fault. It is the state government’s fault or it is the fault of the other members of the frontbench or it is the opposition’s fault or it is the Australian Education Union’s fault or it is the state Premier’s fault. But it is never the minister’s fault. The young people were horrified that the minister would not take responsibility for these failings. Why won’t the minister hear the chorus of discontent that is growing to a roar in the community about her failure to deliver on any of her programs or any of her responsibilities? No. Like Marie Antoinette, she says, ‘They can eat cake.’

The list goes on. Schools are being forced to build Julia Gillard memorial school halls, complete with $3½ million worth of plaques, when they really want something else. One very brave principal, Henry Grossek from Berwick Lodge Primary School, stood up to the government and he succeeded. They wanted to force him to have a gym, but he already had a gym. They told him: ‘You’ve got $3 million for a gym.’ He said, ‘But I’ve already got a gym,’ and they said, ‘You’ll miss out in the first round if you don’t take the gym.’ He said, ‘Well, I’m going to stand up to you.’

Sharryn Jackson (Hasluck, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Ms Jackson interjecting

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

You think it’s so funny, don’t you, you marginal seat members over there from Western Australia. You think it is a complete riot, don’t you, because it is not your money; it is taxpayers’ money, so who cares? Who cares if taxpayers do not get value for money? The member for Hasluck does not care. She has lost before and she has come back. She is in clover. She has won again. She thinks: ‘It’s taxpayers’ money. Let’s live high on the hog.’ ‘Let’s live high on the hog,’ the member for Hasluck says, ‘Who cares about taxpayers’ money?’ That is what you think, isn’t it? Well, we care. The opposition care. Even the Australian Education Union care. You have not even got them in your corner on this.

So Henry Grossek stood up to them and he got them to change their position, and more strength to his arm.

The Auditor-General will also find ideological and bureaucratic hobbyhorse peddling, like the absurd situation where you can have air conditioning in a new building but if you want to put air conditioning in an existing building then you are told that you cannot; you have got to knock the building down. There are examples of schools knocking perfectly good buildings down because they do not have air conditioning and building new buildings so that they can get air conditioning. I am told that, when they ask the bureaucracy why they have to do this, they are told that air conditioning is inefficient, bad for the environment and bad for climate change and ‘We’re not encouraging air conditioning.’ So schools are knocking buildings down so that they can build new buildings with air conditioning. But the minister cannot hear those concerns. They are not really out there. If she pretends it is not happening then it is not really happening.

We have examples in New South Wales, in Queensland and in South Australia of schools that are closing down being granted money, through either National School Pride or the BER, when they are closing down as soon as 2010. How are you going to move the running track? How are you going to move the revegetation, as you claimed was capable of being done?

I finish where I started. Ross Fitzgerald got it right on Monday. This minister is all style and very little substance, long on rhetoric but very short on delivery—all foam and no beer. Ross Fitzgerald hit the middle of the target. The minister should resign and hand the job over to someone who wants to be a full-time minister for education. We do not need a part-time minister for education anymore. She can keep her other portfolios. The minister should hand over her job to someone who wants to be a full-time minister for education—not just a part-time one, using schools and students for her greater ambitions to seek higher office. (Time expired)

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

Can I say first and foremost: I think Australians deserve a better standard of debate about the most important issue of education. Can I also say: I think Australians deserve better than a part-time shadow education minister. It amazes me that if you go to the member’s website you will find that he has only published one speech on education this year—that was a speech on the Bradley higher education reforms. He has not one published speech on schools this year, not one published speech on VET this year, not one published speech on early childhood education this year. But there are two published speeches on the Liberal Party. So I think what people can conclude from that is that he cares twice as much about talking to his Liberal Party colleagues as he does about debating education issues. And the shadow minister just said to me, ‘What about the press releases?’ Well, if you go to his website you will find that he has put out 41 media releases this year. So, out of 222 days, he has done an average of one press release every 5.4 days. So once every working week, five days of a working week, he has struggled and managed to put out one press release—hardly indicative of a shadow minister engaged in the education debate. ‘But,’ I hear you ask, ‘maybe there are volumes and volumes of policies?’ Well, there are not on the website. And then, if you go to the Education for Australia website, what you find is 182 words under the heading, ‘Liberal focus on education,’ and most of it is paying homage to a program of the former Howard government—not one policy, not one idea for the nation’s future on education. This is not good enough for the standard of debate and an indication that the shadow minister does not take his job seriously—and clearly he puts very little effort into getting it done. In contrast, the government is completely focused on delivering our education revolution, which is both a major reform agenda and an unprecedented focus with new resources across education.

Let us go through the elements of the education revolution. Of course, true to form, the shadow minister has only talked about one—the Building the Education Revolution program. Well, can I say to the shadow minister: the Building the Education Revolution program is the biggest school modernisation program in the nation’s history, and I welcome debate and focus on it. But driving an education revolution—and making true the promise of the best possible start in life that this nation should give to every child—actually requires more than that.

But let us just focus for a minute, as the shadow minister did, on the question of the Building the Education Revolution program. I would have to say that I do not think he has got the support of his backbench, because my attention has been drawn to this journal, published by the Hon. Peter Slipper MP, federal member for Fisher—as we would know, a very longstanding member of the Liberal Party and a member of the opposition. I did read it all, of course, but my attention was particularly drawn to the back page: ‘Recent funding announcements’. Here is a list of recent funding announcements, from Peter Slipper for Fisher. There we can go through a list of funding announcements—all the Building the Education Revolution announcements: $200,000 for Beerwah State High School, $75,000 for Beerburrum State School, $200,000 for Buddina, $200,000 for Maleny, $200,000 for Talara, $200,000 for Unity College, $200,000 for another school in Caloundra, $75,000 for Conondale, $125,000 for Delaneys Creek State School—

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

They pay taxes. Why shouldn’t they get spending? Do you think only Labor seats should get it?

Government Members:

Government members interjecting—

Danna Vale (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! There will be no discussion across the chamber.

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

$125,000 for Glenview State School, $200,000 for Golden Beach State School, $200,000 for Kawana Waters State College, $125,000 for Kilcoy State High School and $150,000 for Landsborough State School—claimed by the member as his own work: an endorsement of Building the Education Revolution.

But can I say to the member for Fisher that he is not alone in being someone who endorses Building the Education Revolution. Let us go to the education representatives in this country—the people who have made their life’s work advocating for schools. What do they say about Building the Education Revolution? Therese Temby, Chair of the National Catholic Education Commission, says:

The BER funding allocated by the government is being well spent. Projects are proceeding according to budget and on time, with maximum use of local project management and local building contractors—

Those are the words of the person who speaks on behalf of Catholic schools. Then Bill Daniels says:

I can assure you that those associated with 110,000 independent school communities throughout Australia welcome this additional support and are determined to use the funds efficiently and effectively.

That is the man who speaks on behalf of independent schools. Then Leonie Trimper, the person who speaks on behalf of primary principals, says:

The Australian Primary Principals Association today reiterated its strong support for the Federal Government’s $14.7 billion investment for Australia’s 9200 schools. The magnitude and scope of the Federal Government’s capital investment is unprecedented.

So those who have dedicated their lives to improving the quality of Australia’s education system endorse Building the Education Revolution.

The shadow minister comes into this parliament very frequently long on rhetoric, short on proof, making unsubstantiated allegations about Building the Education Revolution which he has mainly lifted from the pages of newspapers, not having done any original research. He should speak to the people who speak on behalf of schools. If he does he will find the attitudes expressed by the people I have just quoted.

More broadly on the education revolution, of which Building the Education Revolution is just one part, today the education revolution has drawn some unlikely support. Given that from time to time I have been known in this parliament to quote the words of the Australian newspaper not necessarily approvingly, I would today draw the House’s attention to the editorial of the Australian newspaper, which talks about it being crunch time in schools, talks about the Rudd Labor government’s determination on transparency and says:

Ms Gillard has been solid in her determination to lift standards, already doing more in less than two years than the Coalition did in 11 years.

That is the editorial of the Australian newspaper today. A dodgy throat is not helping me today, Madam Deputy Speaker. I apologise for that.

What we did when we came to government is say to ourselves, ‘Should we try and make sure that every Australian child gets the best possible start in life and a high-quality education?’ We answered that question yes—yes as a matter of equity and yes as a matter of future economic development for this nation. Then we asked ourselves the question, ‘Can we?’ We answered that question yes. If you are prepared to invest in the education of the most disadvantaged child in this country, you can make sure that child gets a great education and succeeds at school. Then we said to ourselves, ‘How can we make that difference?’ The first thing we realised is that, after more than a decade of neglect and rhetoric by the former government, you could not even sit here as a federal government and say, ‘Bring me a list of the thousand most disadvantaged schools in this country.’ You could not do that as federal education minister. If you said to the department, ‘Bring me a list of those thousand schools where the kids at them come from low income families, which teach many Indigenous children, which teach many children with disabilities, which teach many children from migrant and refugee backgrounds and which teach kids whose parents themselves did not succeed at school. Could you bring me that list?’, the answer would be no. After more than a decade of talking about school transparency by the Liberal Party, that information does not exist. So piece by piece we set about getting those transparency measures so that not only we, the government, but the community can see where educational attainment is, where disadvantage is, and act to make a difference. That is why our transparency measures are so fundamental to our program. Then those transparency measures will relate to and drive new improvements in educational quality across the board.

What do we know makes a difference to kids’ achievement? It is the quality of teaching. What are we investing in? The quality of teaching. What has this government already achieved? It has achieved, just to start, a system in New South Wales where the best teachers will be paid more money to go to the worst schools, the schools that are doing it the toughest. This is a tremendously profound educational reform delivered by the education revolution. What else have we achieved? We have achieved a new way of getting into teaching as a high-performing graduate, which means as a high-performing graduate you can go and help the most disadvantaged schools by teaching in them. This is, again, a profound reform already in train from this government. And we have created a new partnership, $1.5 billion to bring new resources to the most disadvantaged schools to make a difference for them. In addition to those reforms, we have got new investments in literacy and numeracy to make a difference to those kids who struggle the most with the foundation stones of learning.

This comes on top of the work we are doing on a national curriculum to lift standards around the country. It comes on top of the work we are doing in early childhood education to make sure that kids come to school ready to learn. One thing primary school teachers around the country will tell you is that they can tell the difference in a child who has had a quality preschool program and comes to school ready to learn. And we are going to make a difference post-school by ensuring new investments into VET, which we are already making, and of course new investments into universities. We are funding universities in a way which will create a sustainable and long-lasting partnership between universities and disadvantaged schools. For too long our universities have said, ‘We don’t educate enough students from low socioeconomic status families because they fail out of the school system, and we can’t fix that.’ We have said to universities, ‘You are amongst the brightest people in the nation. Why don’t we create an incentive for you to work with the most disadvantaged schools and actually make a difference to them?’, and we have done that.

This is a profound set of reforms right across the educational spectrum. The reforms work with our focus on the kinds of new skills and new learning that children will need in this century. That is why we have brought the digital education revolution to secondary schools. There are 78,000 new computers already in schools, and a ratio of one to one for senior secondary students will be achieved in 2011.

But the learning skills of the new century will not just be on computers; they will also be in trades, and many children will choose that pathway. But they are not going to do it in 1950s facilities and that is why we are bringing trades training centres to each secondary school around the country.

Many schools have chosen to cluster and build bigger facilities. This has been misrepresented by the opposition as somehow schools missing out. They have chosen to do that. The entitlement is there for schools to participate in this program over the 10 years of its rollout. It has already made a difference, with the allocations of funds for 432 schools and 138 projects.

This is an integrated set of reforms right across our education system, from the education of our youngest children through to the education of people in universities. It strikes me as amazing that the Liberal Party says it wants to contend to be the government of this country but it basically has nothing to say about this profound reform agenda and certainly has no alternative. The nation deserves better from the Liberal Party than that. (Time expired)

Luke Hartsuyker (Cowper, National Party, Deputy Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You have got to hand it to the Rudd government: they are all about spin. They are big on spin, they are big on cliches, they are big on promises, they are big on hard hats and orange vests but they are small on results. When they coined the phrase ‘the education revolution’, a reasonable person would have believed that they were thinking about a quantum leap in standards or that they were talking about greater access to education for all Australians, no matter where they live. The Australian people should have been able to expect, I believe, that they would receive real results delivered on the ground, not government spin.

When we look at the Building the Education Revolution program and the rollout of this program, it is more an education illusion than an education revolution. We see a program that has been characterised by waste and mismanagement. We see a program that is not delivering services effectively. We see a program that is so much subject to this allegation of waste that the Auditor-General is in fact undertaking a full performance audit. It must be something that should be recorded in the Guinness Book of Recordsa program only three months old and already the subject of a full performance audit, such is the waste by this minister and such is the mismanagement on this minister’s watch.

The education revolution should have as its aim access to education for all Australians and access to education no matter where you live. A true education revolution would have the aim of maximising the potential of our youth. A true education revolution would have as its aim maximising national productivity. Instead, we see Labor’s education illusion being all about hard-hat photo opportunities and spin rather than about improving the prospects for our youth.

I would ask the members opposite: how is denying youth allowance to people in regional and rural areas going to build an education revolution? How is denying youth allowance going to affect the youth of our country? It is going to discourage the youth of this country; it is not going to improve their prospects. The changes that this government proposes to put in place with regard to independent youth allowance will severely disadvantage regional students and rural students. From 1 January next year, this government is proposing to alter the eligibility for independent youth allowance so that students will have to work 30 hours per week for 18 months in order to qualify. These changes will affect all students but will impact most heavily on those students who are required to move away from home to pursue the course of their choice.

Whilst metro students in many cases can do the course of their choice within commuting distance of their homes, regional and rural students often have to travel long distances and incur great expense to access the same opportunities, opportunities that are much more readily available to people in our major cities. The government changes will effectively eliminate the gap year, where many students defer their course to earn enough money in 12 months to qualify for independent youth allowance. This proposed change will greatly affect thousands of students who wish to study in future years.

But its impact will be greatest on those students who are in their gap year this year and who are working towards earning $19,500 so as to qualify for independent youth allowance in 2010. These students have planned their work and their studies but they have been kicked in the teeth by this government. They have been basically confronted with what will effectively be retrospective legislation. Many of these students chose to defer their studies and to work for a year specifically to gain access to that independent youth allowance so that they would be financially able to complete their course, financially able to support themselves, and that has been dashed by the policy moves of this government. They made a decision based on the eligibility criteria. They made that decision in good faith on the criteria that existed at the time they commenced their gap year.

Many will not be able to defer for 18 months and many will not be able to secure the 30 hours per week which is required to qualify under the new scheme. As a result, what is going to happen? The result will be that many students from regional and rural areas will not get the benefits of tertiary training, will not get opportunities to upskill and will not get opportunities to maximise their potential in this country, which should be the aim of the so-called education revolution.

The requirement that students work 30 hours per week totally ignores the difficulties of obtaining employment in regional areas. Employment opportunities are limited in regional areas compared to the city. It is not easy to obtain 30 hours of employment each and every week. It is not an easy thing to do. What is worse, Centrelink is advising students that under the new guidelines—very ‘revolutionary’ indeed—a student unable to secure 30 hours of work in any one week has to go back to scratch with regard to their eligibility and start the process all over again. How realistic is that? The student is precluded from banking hours in the weeks where he or she may do 60 hours a week. He or she cannot bank those hours for the weeks when work may not be available.

It is absolutely outrageous to apply these guidelines in this way, it is absolutely discriminatory and it could not form part of a so-called education revolution. Where does this leave regional and rural students who are in seasonal areas, where work is perhaps available at harvest time, or in tourist areas, where—

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

Put them on ice!

Luke Hartsuyker (Cowper, National Party, Deputy Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That is it; they have to go into some form of suspended animation. The reality is that these changes are a retrograde step and discriminate against people from regional and rural areas. This policy totally disregards the plight of students from regional and rural areas, where employment options are limited, work is largely seasonal and it is very difficult to achieve the 30-hour-per-week benchmark. It is a policy that has impacted on students who acted in good faith, who had started their gap year this year and who had their plan in place to better themselves into the future, and they have had those plans dashed. This callous minister, who is out of touch, refuses to consider their plight.

It is interesting to note the comments of the Victorian parliament’s Education and Training Committee, chaired by the Labor member Geoff Howard.

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

Labor?

Luke Hartsuyker (Cowper, National Party, Deputy Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes, Labor. Geoff Howard is a famous name about this House. He is a Labor member in a committee with a Labor majority.

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

Mr Pyne interjecting

Luke Hartsuyker (Cowper, National Party, Deputy Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That is correct, yes. The committee investigated the issue of rural disadvantage in relation to the government’s youth allowance measures. The report was supported unanimously by all participants, and what did they find? What did this committee find? The committee said:

… the Committee believes that the removal of the main workforce participation route will have a disastrous effect on young people in rural and regional areas.

A disastrous effect!

Darren Chester (Gippsland, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What sort of effect?

Luke Hartsuyker (Cowper, National Party, Deputy Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

A disastrous effect, Member for Gippsland. This is a committee chaired by Labor, with a majority held by Labor, concluding what this government will not admit: that these changes will have a disastrous effect. The committee went on to say that it:

… will have a detrimental impact on many students who deferred their studies during 2009 in order to work and earn sufficient money to be eligible for Youth Allowance.

So there we have a Labor committee, from a Labor state government, with a Labor majority, concluding that this will be bad for students in regional and rural areas and bad for the so-called education revolution.

So how does the denial of independent youth allowance to so many regional and rural students contribute to an education revolution? How is making it more difficult for regional and rural students to obtain tertiary qualifications and trade skills—when they are more likely to go back into the regions where those skills are required—taking them out of the system or giving them a disincentive going to improve this nation into the future? I would maintain that this is one of the greatest backward steps in Australian education in quite some years.

How can the government claim that it is fair to pull the rug out from under regional and rural students who made decisions some time back on their future based on the status quo? How can it claim it to be fair to discriminate against students who face far higher costs in obtaining an education than those in the metropolitan areas? The government should be condemned for these changes. The Building the Education Revolution program has proven to be grossly mismanaged. It is proving to be working against many students, particularly those in regional and rural areas.

Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We have a saying in Victoria that most Victorians will be familiar with. We say in Victoria, ‘You’ve got more front than Myers,’ and I am sure there are in fact similar expressions in other states in relation to their department stores. It is used to refer to someone who is a bit shameless and sometimes insincere and frequently to someone who has a bit of cheek raising the issue given their own position. That is exactly what we have with this MPI today: an opposition and a shadow minister with more front than Myers. Here we have an opposition very ready to criticise and, in fact, vote against the most significant investment and reform in our schools that we have seen, all without having a policy of their own. Where is the opposition’s early learning policy? Where is the opposition’s policy on schools and overcoming disadvantage in our education system? Where is the opposition’s substantive response to the Bradley review? There is the problem for the opposition: all they do is carp about the government’s policy, but they have absolutely no policies of their own. They are a policy-free zone when it comes to education. Here they are, trying to pretend that the past 11 years of their time in government has disappeared into some black hole and ceased to exist and that they—only they—could do things better, if only they had been elected in 2007. I can assure the Australian people and those listening to this debate that nothing could be further from the truth.

During the election, I and many of my colleagues made a commitment that we would invest substantially in education, and that is exactly what we are doing. The Rudd government is delivering an education revolution to the entire education system, from preschools and schools through to TAFE and universities. It is now 20 months since we were elected, and I stand in this House proud to say that our nation’s education revolution is well and truly underway.

I want to put on the record just what we have achieved so far. We have committed an unprecedented $14.7 billion to the largest school building and modernisation program in this nation’s history. Through the National School Pride program, we have already seen $1.3 billion go to over 9,400 schools across Australia. In my own electorate, 85 schools received some $9.56 million, going towards much-needed refurbishment and renewal of existing infrastructure or to build minor infrastructure. It is also proving great for supporting local jobs. Just over two weeks ago, I visited a school in my own electorate, Pentland Primary School, which received some $75,000 under this program. The principal at the school told me that right from the start he wanted the project to be a community project, involving local tradespeople and business. Ten local tradespeople have been involved in the project, and I met with some of them. They overwhelmingly told me that, if not for the government investment, they would absolutely be struggling for work.

As part of the Rudd government’s $14.7 billion commitment to Building the Education Revolution, we have also seen our Primary Schools for the 21st Century program, the subject of this MPI. In my own electorate, 77 schools so far have been announced as receiving some $96.4 million, an unprecedented investment in building up our schools—the greatest that I have ever seen. One of the most exciting aspects of Building the Education Revolution, which will leave a lasting legacy, is the building of 21st century libraries, a lasting legacy which will have a significant impact on the learning outcomes for an entire generation of children. What could be more revolutionary than that?

On top of this, $810 million has been approved to build and refurbish 537 science laboratories and language centres. I am proud that Mount Clear College in my own electorate will build an Asian Languages Centre—incorporating within this centre Australia’s first Confucius classroom in partnership with Nanjing No 1 School in China. This is alongside the government’s reintroduction of the NALSAS program, which was cut by the previous government. It will put young people who go through this centre in a prime position for employment opportunities here and overseas.

We have heard from the opposition members today about the issue of accountability. We have heard the member for Sturt gleefully welcoming the audit of the Building the Education Revolution as though somehow the fact that there is an audit into such a large program expenditure is unusual. Not only do the opposition want the audit report—they are gleefully welcoming the audit report, as are we; we are very pleased it is occurring—but they also seek to pre-empt the actual outcome. I have sat on the Joint Committee for Public Accounts and Audit for a long period of time and I can tell the House there is nothing unusual about the Audit Office undertaking an audit of a program of this size. It is extremely common that that occurs. In fact, what would have been unusual is if they had not done an audit into this program.

It is disappointing that the Shadow Minister for Education has not been supportive of the education revolution. We welcome the audit of this program because we know that a review will outline to those opposite how the Building the Education Revolution is working to improve education facilities across every corner of our nation, and how local communities are benefiting from this new infrastructure.

We do know that with such an unprecedented level of investment there will be difficulties, given the time frames, the complexity of the programs and this massive investment. This is a huge, unprecedented level of investment. There will, of course, be problems. But, unlike the opposition, who are using every problem that occurs—we know they are going to occur—to make a political point, those of us on this side of the House are working through those problems and trying to actually fix them, because they are all completely fixable. It is understandable that they are occurring, but we on this side of the House do not want to make political points about them; we actually want to get on with the business of building this important infrastructure and fixing the problems as they occur.

The member for Sturt has also made much of the need for value for money. I would like the member for Sturt—and the offer is out there—to make a list of every school which he does not believe should be getting funding. He should make a list of every school which he thinks has been poorly targeted, and we can go to those schools and let them know that the opposition does not believe that they should get funding. But let me wait. In fact, the opposition do not believe that any school should get any funding because they voted against this proposition. Here they are, saying, ‘It is poorly targeted. It should be better targeted. There are problems with it,’ about a program which if they had been in government would not exist at all—not a single school would be getting a cent.

I wonder if the member for Sturt will go along to the opening of the infrastructure projects in his electorate—infrastructure projects like the one at the Paradise Primary School. I read in one of the local newspapers in his electorate, the East Torrens Messenger, that the Paradise Primary School Principal, Peter Scragg, is pretty excited about the funding that he is getting. He says:

This Federal Government initiative has allowed us, for the first time in a long time, to lift our eyes to the horizon, to have a pipe dream of what is possible …

It is disappointing that the member for Sturt is so unsupportive of that dream.

The Rudd government is also delivering $2.2 billion to a digital education revolution. To date, 78,000 computers have been delivered to Australian schools. Fourteen schools in my own electorate share in 2,154 new computers. We are delivering on our $2.5 billion Trades Training Centres in Schools Program. So far, over 400 schools nationwide have benefited from the $425 million already announced.

Across the nation we have also seen 15 projects approved under the first round of our Local Schools Working Together Pilot Program. Some $31.7 million has already been delivered of the total $62.5 million available. Again in my own electorate, Sebastopol College, in partnership with other schools, is building a $2.476 million college community hub, which will be a significant asset for an area in my community that has been disadvantaged for some time. It is a great project. We have acted with the states and territories to deliver a national curriculum, and already significant progress has been made. We have invested through the National Education Agreement, and are working far more closely on transparency and accountability across the system. These are all significant reforms.

Unlike the opposition, who sit in a policy vacuum, this government believe that all children, regardless of their background or location, should be given the opportunity to achieve their full potential. We want to lift literacy and numeracy rates, we want to make sure that young people are being taught by high-quality teachers, we want schools to provide support for disadvantaged students and we want higher standards in all schools. Parents have the right to expect the very best education facilities and learning experience for their children. We are delivering through both a major reform agenda and an unprecedented investment in education infrastructure. Rather than criticising and carping about our policies, it is well and truly time the Opposition came up with one of their own. (Time expired)

Steve Irons (Swan, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Today I rise to talk about a revolution that was proposed and heralded across the land as the saviour of the children and their parents of this great nation called Australia. The so called revolution called the Building the Education Revolution was announced with great fanfare by the Deputy Prime Minister. If we go to the government website we are met with the front page introduction which says:

The Australian Government will invest a further $14.7 billion to boost the Education Revolution over the next three years.

Building the Education Revolution (BER) begins this year, and will provide infrastructure funding so each of Australia’s 9,540 schools can meet the needs of 21st century students and teachers.

This is a critical component of the Government’s economic stimulus package, giving our schools the attention they so richly deserve.

It is a great introduction and a fantastic objective with admirable ideals, but only if these objectives are actually going to be met.

It is hard to believe how poorly this scheme has been thought out and managed. The efficiencies of this scheme are shocking, and there are numerous examples Australia wide of this. How can a huge investment of $14.7 billion have achieved no better educational outcomes? From across the nation principals have come forward to tell stories of the scheme’s inflexibility and poor value for money. They have revealed duplication and bureaucracy, contradiction and profiteering, whilst the opposition and journalists have revealed extravagance and wastage. I have heard from principals in my own electorate of Swan about how ridiculous it is that they are being forced to duplicate existing facilities.

Once schools have been forced to accept these buildings, they are then told which government builders they have to hire. For many communities the specially approved contractors are not even local. The stimulus effect of this package was designed to flow through to many businesses Australia wide. In Western Australia we had one of the school package tenders come in over budget by 10 to 20 per cent. In the first instance, how much money do the consultants get paid for these budget forecasts? Is this good and efficient spending? As a result of this, a letter was sent to three major contractors asking them to meet the budget and then they would get all the work. I believe this was done and the effect was a flow-through to the subcontractors of what is known in the building industry as a ‘screw’.

In so many trades—and, having spent 20 years in the building industry, I can say that tradies do not call themselves tradies, which is something that the government might learn; they actually refer to themselves as brickies, sparkies or chippies but not tradies; that is something thought up by the advertising gurus—the subbies have been unmercifully put through the screwing process. Many are going into these contracts not making a cent and many will lose money on these projects. What a great effect that stimulus has had! Today the Deputy Prime Minister stood in this place and spoke about BER and supporting jobs. Making companies lose money is not supporting jobs. It will help companies go to the wall. When the question got a bit tough, it was back to the blame game, with the Deputy Prime Minister blaming the states for the problems. This government is just unbelievable. It does all the things it blamed the coalition for doing.

Costs are being siphoned off. The Australian has even reported that up to one-third of the money that primary schools are receiving for new libraries and school halls is being swallowed up by contractors in upfront costs before the contracts begin. The upfront costs can be up to $100,000 and the compliance costs must be met by the company, which inevitably means the taxpayer, just to satisfy the government. They must then be reported on before the company qualifies to do the work. One of the areas they have to report on is employment. They have to report Indigenous employment and apprenticeship employment. I am sure the government will find some way to use these figures as propaganda—as new job employment figures due to their stimulus package and BER.

Maybe the government could advise how many companies have been paid through the BMW. Members may wonder why I ask this question. A building contractor in Perth submitted some progress plans last week for payment and was advised by the architect that he could not be paid. Why? It was because the payment system has not been established so that people can actually get paid for the work they have done, and the architect could not advise when the company would actually be paid for their claims. What a fantastic system! This is typical of Labor. It is all about spin but there is no attention to detail or process. An editorial in the Australian on 27 July summed it up the best, describing:

… Adelaide students being left to bake in 40C summers without any airconditioning as a new gym is built; duplication of adequate multi-purpose halls and libraries; $15,000 allocated in New South Wales for a 10,000-litre water tank when a 12,000-litre tank was available for less than a third of the price, $4348.

What about the waste of the $3 million being spent on plaques to commemorate the Building the Education Revolution? In my electorate, whilst the promised Belmont Medicare office remains unopened, whilst the promised Great Eastern Highway remains uncompleted, whilst funding is cut to volunteer groups in the Canning wetlands and whilst Swan River infrastructure projects are passed over, the Labor Party sees fit to spend $3 million on commemorative plaques. (Time expired)

Maxine McKew (Bennelong, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have been listening with some amazement during this debate to what I think I have to call the opposition’s mock outrage and to a lot of the fallacies in their arguments. Just what is it that gets their goat about funding the schools of the future and supporting jobs in the process? As I think about it, perhaps it is a sense of shame at their neglect of education over the 11 years they were in government. By contrast, as the Deputy Prime Minister has said, in 20 months there has been $14.7 billion invested—the largest school building and modernisation program ever seen in this country. There has been $1.3 billion for 9,490 schools under the National School Pride program. That supports around 30,000 jobs. There has been $9.19 billion for more than 5,000 schools under the Primary Schools for the 21st Century. That supports around 15,000 jobs. More than 78,000 computers have been delivered to schools, and there has been a record investment of more than $3.6 billion in the early years, which are where the education revolution begins.

But it is much more than that. It is about what previous Liberal governments I think understood but failed to address—that is, that we have an education system that produces an unacceptably long tale of disadvantage. As Professor Glyn Davis from Melbourne university has said repeatedly, Australia has a system that is high on quality but low on equity. That, of course, is unacceptable and we are addressing that, firstly, by insisting on knowing precisely what it is that is going on in our schools. To that end, we have provided significant funding through national partnership agreements to address deficiencies in literacy and numeracy. It is about ensuring that the best teachers are teaching in the most disadvantaged schools. That means that we are committed to transparency on data on school performance. On this point, I know that the member for Bradfield is not in the House at the moment but, as the former Liberal Minister for Education, he has a deep understanding of this. He has some serious intellectual grunt on this issue. He is committed. He continues to be committed to ensuring that transparency is available around schools data, and he is right. It is just a shame that his state Liberal colleagues in New South Wales do not listen to him. It is also a shame that the member for Bradfield, when he had the chance, could not deliver on national collection of school performance data—reliable data which will identify disadvantage. Well, we are delivering.

As far as the investment in the infrastructure in our schools is concerned, if any of the members opposite want to get some genuine feedback, as opposed to relying on tabloid headlines, then they should come to my electorate—to Ryde, for instance, and meet with Father Paul Monkerud from St Charles primary school. I am sure that Father Paul would be happy to repeat what he said to me as he contemplated the almost complete redesign of his parish school. He sent me a letter recently which said:

I believe that BER and the pride initiatives are gifts of divine providence. We are so blessed to have a developed plan to take advantage of this opportunity.

So here is St Charles, ready to go with a complete redesign of the school with the money provided from the Commonwealth.

If members opposite are still sceptical, they could go a bit further north in my electorate to Epping Boys High School. I am sure the principal, Peter Garrard, would repeat to members opposite what he said so me only last week—that is, that this year, for the very first time, Epping boys will be able to hold their speech day on site at the school. That is because of federal government funding through the education revolution. By the way, it is going to save Epping boys something like $10,000 a year because they will not have to go to other schools to hire out their facilities. There are stories like this in schools right across Bennelong—Catholic, public and private schools.

Finally, one of the highlights of my year was back in early June when the Deputy Prime Minister came to Eastwood Public School in my electorate. On that day, the Deputy Prime Minister announced $2.3 billion in funding for New South Wales schools under the second round of the BER funding. For Eastwood Public in particular it meant six new classrooms. That is what the Deputy Prime Minister was able to deliver for the parents, teachers and students of the Eastwood community. What a contrast with the Leader of the Opposition. When he came into Eastwood just a couple of weeks ago, what did he do? He put on his nice apron and he stacked bananas.

Arch Bevis (Brisbane, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The time for this discussion has now expired.