Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I would encourage the previous speaker, Senator Crossin, to actually have a look at the Schools Assistance (Learning Together—Achievement Through Choice and Opportunity) Amendment Bill 2007 and the second reading speech. Part of the bill provides for $9.445 million for literacy, numeracy and special learning needs programs, but I did not hear the previous speaker give the Howard government any credit for that whatsoever. Obviously, she has not read the bill, and she has certainly not taken any notice of the second reading speech, in which all of this was explained.

It is probably appropriate at the beginning of my speech to do a reality check of education. I ask the Senate: why do we have states? We have states to look after things like policing, health, housing and education. Education is a state issue. To help with that, the Howard government has provided all of the states and territories with a huge windfall tax gain called the goods and services tax—the GST. Senators will well remember, though I am amazed that many Australians still do not know, that every single cent of the GST goes to the state and territory governments. They have enormous amounts of money. They are rolling in money from the GST. And yet what have the states done with that? Across all states we have the worst health system that we have seen for many years. The health system is going backwards at a time when the states are getting more and more money from the Commonwealth through the GST and more and more money from the Commonwealth through direct grants for health.

So what do you have states for? They cannot look after health and they are pretty ordinary at looking after housing—let us look at schooling. What have the states done for schooling? This is a state issue. Everything that Senator Crossin spoke about is probably true, but why don’t the states, which have the responsibility for schooling and education, actually do something about it? It is okay for Senator Crossin to come in here and blame the federal government, but it is the state governments that have responsibility for education. The state governments should be doing all the sorts of things that Senator Crossin spoke about, but they do not, and so yet again the Howard government has come riding to the rescue of the states by providing some $1.81 billion for schooling. Why have we done that? Because the states are not meeting their responsibilities to the young people of Australia. The states are not providing the funds that are needed to give our children a good education. For decades—centuries even—the states have been in charge of education, and they have given us a system which is very second-rate. So the Howard government has come along and provided this money to help out.

The money the Commonwealth government is providing goes to all children. We do not have this class warfare distinction that the Labor Party seem to have every now and again. I am not sure whether today they are on the class warfare bit or whether they turned it over a couple of days ago. I notice that the front page of today’s Australian indicates that the present ALP platform is that Labor governments must give priority to public schools—the old class warfare stuff. Private schools or Catholic schools are for the rich and the poor people all go to state schools. I should declare an interest here: I went to a state school—I never went to a private school—and I share that distinction with the Prime Minister. We are both very well served by our state school education. But now parents are voting with their feet. Nowadays the state schools system is so poor that parents want to look to Catholic and other private schools to give their children a decent education. As I say, parents are voting with their feet. Many parents are taking second jobs so they can get their kids into a private school or a Catholic school. It costs them a bit more, but the state governments have run state schools so poorly that parents do not want to send their kids to them anymore. At great personal cost to themselves, parents are sending their children to private schools because they know they will get a better education there.

Our government wants to support choice for parents. We support the public schools. Indeed, a very substantial part of the funding that has been made available through this bill will go to state schools. Of the additional $181 million allocated—a figure I will come back to shortly—$127 million, a bit more than two-thirds of it, will be going to state owned government schools and $54 million will be going to non-government schools. So the Howard government is fair and even in providing funding for all families so that all children can get an education. On the other hand, the Labor Party, until an announcement a couple of days ago, only wanted to help children going to state schools. All those working-class people—all those ordinary Australians, if I can use that terminology—who want their kids to go to private schools instead of state schools are prepared to work harder, and the Labor Party did not want to help those parents out.

In the last couple of days, I heard Mr Rudd saying that he is going to adopt the Howard government’s approach to schooling and axe Mr Beazley’s hit list of private schools. Mr Rudd has announced it unilaterally, in contravention of the Labor Party platform, it appears to me—that does not seem to worry the Labor Party too much; they have never been very good at following the rules—and told everyone that Labor will not abide by that part of the platform and will adopt the Howard government’s approach to schooling. According to the Australian, some of those on the left of the Labor Party are not too happy about this. I understand that there is a pretty good rearguard action going on now to do Mr Rudd over at the national convention when it occurs in a couple of months. So it will be interesting to see whether the Left of the Labor Party will have their way on schools or whether, with an election coming up, Mr Rudd will be able to paper over these things, smile prettily and confuse people about Labor’s real policy on schools. The good thing is that there is no confusion about the Liberal position on this. We have been clear and up-front. We want to help all children with their schooling. We want to give parents choice in the way they can educate their children. The bill before us today is a tangible recognition of the Howard government’s approach.

A total of $1.181 billion is going into schools, most of it to government schools but a fair share to private schools. In the amending bill before us today we are adding another $181 million to the Investing in Our Schools Program, bringing the total amount committed by the Howard government for schooling to $1.181 billion. It is a great news story. One would think that Labor senators would be in here congratulating the government on this additional input into schools.

Senator Crossin mentioned flagpoles in a derogatory way. I happen to think the proposal is a pretty good one. I remember going to Croydon to open a little school up in the Gulf of Carpentaria. It was a long way for me to go but I was able to do a few other things while I was in the area. It was great to go to that small school in the gulf, Croydon State School, and to see how proud those kids were—if my memory serves me correctly, there were about 30 kids in the whole school—to be able to fly the Australian flag. The majority of the children were of Aboriginal descent. They were all very proud Australians. They had an Aboriginal flag there, as well as a Torres Strait Islander flag—and good luck to them. They were acknowledging themselves as proud Australians. It was a great day when we were able to launch that flagpole.

Going around North Queensland and looking at the work that has been done by state and private schools under the Investing in Our Schools Program is practically a full-time job for me. I have been to St Anthony’s up in the northern beaches of Townsville, the Catholic school in Mareeba, the state and Catholic schools in Biloela and the Mount Archer State School in Rockhampton looking at the work that has been done with this money. Many of the schools have received up to $150,000. A new element of the program is that this additional $181 million will go to those schools which so far have not applied for and have not received money. Up to $100,000 will be made available under the next stage of the Investing in Our Schools Program. Not every school will get $100,000. It is a semi-competitive program and the schools have to justify what they need.

I have to tell you, Mr Acting Deputy President, that this program is one of the most welcomed and most gratefully received programs that the federal government has ever introduced. In the past, state governments starved their schools of funding. While schools require shade areas, new playgrounds and new classrooms, the state governments are too busy spending their money on spin doctors, bureaucrats—public servants—getting the message out and playing politics. They are not too interested in spending money on schools. Children desperately need these additions. What is the alternative? The parents and citizens groups have to go and sell raffle tickets to raise the money to put in air conditioners, shade areas or new playgrounds for the children. These are essential items in the education system. At night-time or after work the mums and dads have to go and sell raffle tickets to try and raise money to put into the state schools, which is what the state governments should be doing.

This program not only provides money for children and their education but also relieves parents from some of the more arduous asks of having to raise money to put the essentials into state schools. In many private and Catholic schools the P&Cs do a lot of work. I know many parents take on an extra job so they can afford to send their kids to a private school, because they believe they get a better education there. This program also helps those mums and dads because it relieves them a little of the obligation to raise additional funding for the education of their children. These funds assist with buildings, maintenance and the updating of schools throughout Australia. As I have indicated, there has been a very enthusiastic response from schools for funding under the Investing in Our Schools Program.

I might say in passing that the Minister for Education, Science and Training, Ms Bishop, and the parliamentary secretary, Mr Pat Farmer, do a fabulous job. I think Ms Bishop, as education minister, has been quite outstanding in the work she has done in recent times helping our schools. I also congratulate Pat Farmer. He has been as enthusiastic in his involvement with this program and in helping schools as he was in his athletic events in years gone by. I think some of his athleticism, energy and enthusiasm have carried over into the way he has helped to develop this program.

So far the minister has approved over 15,000 projects from government schools and over 2,000 from non-government schools. I seem to have opened many of those, because my weekly work seems to involve going from one end of Queensland to another opening these schools. I know that my Liberal Senate colleagues in Queensland, Senator Mason, Senator Brandis and Senator Trood, have been doing the same sort of thing. I know that our local members, Mr Entsch in Cairns, Mr Lindsay in Townsville and Mr Macfarlane in Groom, and all our members on the Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast and around Brisbane spend a lot of their days going and seeing the great work that is being done—being lobbied, I have to say, by parents and citizens, presidents and treasurers for a little extra funding, and principals wanting to talk to their local representatives about new initiatives the Investing in Our Schools Program could help with. So it has been a great program and a very well received program.

That brings me back to almost where I started. When you see the effort the Australian government has put into education you wonder why we bother to have states. You really do. They cannot run hospitals, they cannot run schools, they cannot run housing and they cannot run the road system. In spite of the enormous amount of money that we give them through the GST and through special grants, they cannot do any of these things and they have to come to the Commonwealth government, which has an understanding of the needs of these things, to bail them out of problems all the time.

This bill will provide funding, for schools that have received little or no funding to date, of up to $100,000 for government schools and up to $75,000 for non-government schools. The bill also appropriates some money for the Literacy, Numeracy and Special Learning Needs Program. What Senator Crossin said is right: there is a concern with the education of Indigenous young people because the states are simply not focusing on the issue. This bill will give some money towards the Literacy, Numeracy and Special Learning Needs Program. There are other funding programs that the Commonwealth has provided to try to give Indigenous kids, particularly in remote parts of Australia, the opportunity they need to have a successful and fulfilling future.

It is a good news bill. Congratulations to the minister for bringing the program forward and for convincing cabinet of the need to add to it—I am sure that not a lot of convincing was needed. I am very proud to be part of a government that has put this enormous amount of money into the education and future of young Australians. I certainly commend the bill to the Senate.