Brian Mitchell (Lyons, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Tomorrow the Gonski bus will pull up outside this place. The bus has travelled Australia hearing from teachers and students about the marvellous difference that Gonski funding is making in Australian schools. But those opposite know all about Gonski. A week or so before the 2013 election they signed up to it. The member for Sturt, then the coalition's education shadow minister, told parents, 'You can vote Liberal or Labor and you will get exactly the same amount of funding for your school.' That was untrue.

Under those opposite, Gonski has been an unfolding tragedy. They are refusing to fund the critical fifth and sixth years of the package and they are vesting $30 billion less in schools than Labor. That is exactly not 'exactly the same amount of funding'. In the old days, the member for Sturt would have been bent over the deputy principal's desk, trousers down, and would have received six of the best for being a naughty boy who tells lies. Perhaps instead we can make him write 100 times on a blackboard, 'I must not tell lies to children.' We can set the blackboard up here in the chamber. It would certainly be more entertaining than the Treasurer's pet rock or coal. But this really is no laughing matter. For the 80,806 school students in my home state of Tasmania, $60 million will be cut over 2018-19 and $9 million of that will be axed from my own electorate of Lyons.

The Liberal Hodgman state government has not covered itself in Gonski glory either. It received Gonski funding from the federal government but did not pass the money directly to schools. Instead, it cut its own education funding in 2015 and then used the Gonski money—which should have been invested in extra services and programs—to effectively replace what it had taken out. This meant that schools like Swansea Primary, Evandale Primary, Beaconsfield Primary, St Marys District and Sorell High School all missed out on vital extra funding that is designed to improve outcomes and opportunities.

If Gonski funding had been made properly available to Beaconsfield Primary, the school would have been able to implement an extended reading recovery program, specialist numeracy support, more help for kids who are doing it tough emotionally in that community, better ongoing training for staff and greater opportunities for students to socially connect with the wider West Tamar community, through sport, music and cultural and leadership programs. Swansea school would have been able to extend targeted literacy and numeracy support across a greater number of students and provide an enriching and diverse learning program, including music, art, health, PE and languages. It could have reinstated its annual camp for grades 3 to 6. It could improve targeted support for students who require assistance, such as a speech pathologist, school psychologist or social worker. It could apply digital technologies across the school to equip students for future learning. It could reinstate the program to extend gifted and talented students.

Sorell School—Australia's oldest school that is still on its original site—could have provided more targeted intervention and support for literacy and numeracy, achieved smaller classes, employed additional assistants, provided ongoing professional learning, and improved the tired school environment to make it more welcoming to students and families.

These are just three examples of what schools in my electorate would have been able to do if they had received their full Gonski funding without having to suffer state Liberal government cuts. Instead, it has been business as usual for a state that historically trails on education indices. And it is no coincidence that my state also trails on income indicators. The cynical, short-sighted decision to put its own political interests ahead of the education interests of Tasmanian children represents another low point in what is a very ordinary Hodgman state Liberal government.

Members, I urge you to turn up at the Gonski bus tomorrow from 9 am to speak to some of the principals and parents who are taking part. They have travelled thousands of kilometres and spoken to thousands of Australians. You will hear for yourself about the incredible difference Gonski funding can make in Australian schools and the importance of funding it properly so that it can do its job for our children. Surely the least we can do for our kids is provide for them the best education we can afford as a nation, not merely an education that will barely see them get by.