Gary Humphries (ACT, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I want to make a brief contribution to this debate because I believe it needs to be said that these bills, the Education Legislation Amendment Bill 2008 and the Schools Assistance Bill 2008, place the Senate in a very difficult position and, in my view, undermine the accountability function which the Senate performs by scrutinising legislation. By that I mean that these bills are vehicles, simultaneously, for an extremely large and important sum of money for the operation of non-government schools over the coming quadrennium—some $28 billion worth of funding for those non-government schools. They are also the vehicles for a series of significant but as yet not fully articulated changes in policy that affect those same non-government schools.

I refer in particular to the changes with respect to the new national curriculum framework and the changed and enhanced reporting requirements for non-government schools. What the Senate is being asked to do is to accept that, to achieve one objective, which is the funding of those schools from 1 January 2009, it needs to accept—in part, sight unseen—the other reforms which this legislation gives rise to. That, in my view, is quite an insidious position in which to place the Senate. We are being asked, in effect, to approve one at the cost of the other. There is obviously a game of brinkmanship going on between the government and the opposition as to who will blink first in delivering this important sum of money to non-government schools while at the same time allowing the Senate to properly scrutinise the details of the government’s changes in this area. I think that is quite unacceptable. There is no reason why the Senate should be held hostage to that tactic. I think the issues which the government has placed on the agenda through these bills, with respect to reforming the structure and reporting requirements of education, need to be properly debated. They should be debated in the full light of the detail of the government’s proposals, particularly with respect to the national curriculum, and that should be separated from the question of the money the schools need to operate from 1 January next year. Having said that, I will now comment on some of the detail of those changes.

The national curriculum is, in concept, a worthwhile development which needs to be explored as a platform from which to provide a standard of education which Australians can be proud of and which will sustain a brighter future for education in this country. Setting common standards between the states and territories is a worthwhile idea but, as to whether it actually benefits or disbenefits Australian education, much depends on the execution of that idea. I say that because if, by achieving a certain foundation of common standards through a national curriculum, we destroy the great strength of diversity in Australian education—the great benefits which are provided to parents in being able to choose the style and kind of education they want for their children by sending them to, say, a Montessori school, or a school with a particular religious background or foundation, or a school which offers the International Baccalaureate or something of that kind—we will have lost a great deal of value. We do not know whether the new national curriculum will place at risk those important elements of our diverse education system. I personally would prefer to see more detail of the curriculum on the table before the Senate is asked to sign a cheque to deliver that to the Australian government.

I also record my apprehension at the enhanced reporting requirements for Australian non-government schools in particular. At one level, you might say that it is axiomatically a good thing to have more information on the table, but greater scrutiny of that proposition reveals that there are significant potential downsides. As we know, non-government schools operate on the basis of requiring significant support from the Australian community. Some schools are able to encourage and receive private donations, endowments, gifts and donations in kind. It is possible that some of those benefits and donations to non-government schools may be placed at risk where the donor needs to disclose that. Again, we do not know the detail of how this will work, what exactly will be required, what exactly will be reported and in what form. That, I think, adds to the concern which a number of non-government schools put on the table very clearly during the recent inquiry into this legislation by the Senate Standing Committee on Education, Employment and Workplace Relations.

I note that the Labor Party, certainly at the state and territory level and to some extent at the federal level, historically has been opposed to more transparency with respect to the operation of schools. Reporting on schools’ educational outcomes and things of that kind have been matters which the Labor Party has resisted at both those levels of government in the past. Apparently, they now want more of it, so I am suspicious and I think the Senate needs more information about how these things will work.

I want to record my support for the concerns raised by Senator Macdonald. At the hearings conducted the week before last, the government’s representatives offered very strong assurances that the unintended consequence of potentially affecting adversely the funding levels at boarding schools, especially for Indigenous students, would be addressed in the implementation of this system. But, like Senator Macdonald, I would like to be assured again today by the minister in the chamber that non-government schools offering boarding facilities will not be adversely affected vis-a-vis their present position by the passage of this legislation.

Finally, I think it is quite unacceptable for the Senate to be held hostage by the linking of these as yet partially unexplained reforms to the granting of $28 billion worth of funding for the coming years. It is an exercise in undermining the accountability of the Senate, which I think is quite unacceptable but which we have come to expect from this government. I personally wish to see much more of the federal government’s agenda for non-government education clearly explained in this place and to the Australian community. It has not been explained; it has not been articulated. We do not know what the long-term prospects for this sector are. We do not know, for example, what will succeed the SES funding model when it expires and how the federal government proposes to proceed with its philosophical underpinning for its approach to non-government education. Until I know the detail of that, I remain concerned at the blank cheque which legislation such as this offers to the Australian government.