Nick McKim (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

The Greens do not regard education funding as a cost. We regard education funding as an investment. We are proud to take to the Australia people a fully costed, fully funded platform that puts those offerings to date from either of the establishment parties represented in this place completely in the shade. We have said very clearly we will reverse the Liberals' $30 billion cuts to education over the next decade. We have said, and committed, to fully funding year 5 and 6 of the Gonski reforms. We have recently announced a package of $4.8 billion to support students with disability in our schools based on the nationally consistent collection of data which that minister is still sitting on and refusing, with his colleagues from around the country on the ministerial council, to release so the Australian people can have a look at it.

I well remember the infamous unity ticket promised by former Prime Minister Tony Abbott prior to the 2013 election, where he said, in effect, there was not a wafer of difference between the coalition on one side and Labor and the Greens on the other side on school funding. I well remember the actual unity ticket that emerged after the 2013 election, when then Commonwealth Minister Christopher Pyne went back on the commitment given prior to the election by former PM Mr Abbott and attempted to walk away in totality from the Gonski funding.

I well remember the ministerial council that I attended as a Greens minister on behalf of Tasmania, along with my Labor colleagues, a Liberal colleague and even a National Party colleague, when together we formed the real unity ticket on education. We rolled Mr Pyne at that meeting and forced him very soon afterwards to come out and at least commit to four years of Gonski funding on behalf of the Commonwealth. That was the real unity ticket on education. It was a Labor Liberal National Greens unity ticket on education, and that was the unity ticket that at least delivered the Commonwealth to a four-year Gonski funding commitment. It is worth putting on the record that two-thirds of the Gonski funding was due in year 5 and 6, and that is what the Commonwealth have walked away from in the context of the current debate and in the lead-up to this election.

We have costed our Gonski at $3.5 billion over the budget out years, over and above the coalition's current school's budget. That is about making sure that our kids who go to school have the supports they need, the resources they need and the investment in to teachers and school leaders that is so critical to delivering improved educational outcomes in Australia. But we have also committed $4.8 billion to students with disability in Australian schools, putting in the shade the just over $100 million recently announced by the Commonwealth in the lead-up to the budget and, quite frankly, the pittance of $375 million over the budget out years that Labor are offering students with disabilities.

We want to invest in extra supports for students with disabilities, but we do not regard this as a disability policy; we regard it as an ability policy. Our goal is to allow students who have a disability to maximise their ability, so that they can achieve what they have dreams to achieve in their lives, to maximise their potential, to maximise their abilities and to give them every opportunity to put back into our community and to be constructive members of our society and of our economy.

This is an investment unprecedented in Australian political history that the Greens are proposing to make. It is the single biggest investment into supporting students with disabilities and we are absolutely proud that we will back those kids and the people who teach and support those children in our schools to maximise their abilities.

This funding will assist with the provision of teacher assistance, which parents of students with disabilities will know is an absolutely crucial way that schools can support students with disabilities. But it is not just about extra teacher assistance. It is not just about training up teachers. It is not just about training up school leaders and ensuring that school communities and school associations understand the challenges and the potential solutions for those challenges. It is also about ensuring proper infrastructure in our schools. That can be anything from wheelchair accessibility around a school through to accessibility for transport for students with disabilities.

We are proud to have announced that funding. I was proud to announce it with our leader, Richard Di Natale, a few weeks ago in Melbourne. It is important because the NCCD data on students with disability has identified 467,000 students with disability across Australia. On the most recent figures, which are 2013 figures, 190,000 students received extra funding for their disabilities in Australian schools. That means we are currently directly supporting less than half of the students who have been identified through the NCCD process as needing supports due to their disabilities. Less than one in two students across all schools sectors in Australia are being recognised and appropriately resourced by governments. That is a shameful statistic. It is a national shame that we are not supporting those students to the degree that they need and deserve.

It is worth pointing out that nine out of 10 students with disability attend a mainstream school in our country and around three out of every four attend a public school. Nearly one in two come from families that live in or near poverty in Australia. They are 33 per cent more likely not to study beyond year 10 than students without a disability and they are nearly twice as likely not to complete year 12 than students without a disability. Again those are shameful statistics. It is truly a national shame the way we do not support students with disabilities to the extent that they need and deserve in our schools.

We are also proposing the development of a national strategy to improve the education of students with disability. That has been recommended by a Senate inquiry. The key features of our proposal around a national strategy include recognising all students with disability as learners, ensuring all students with disability benefit from evidence-based, best-practice programs, having best-practice ongoing professional development for teachers and school leaders—that is a critical part of our package, and funding announced in our $4.8 billion can be used for the professional development of teachers and school leaders—and, crucially, including students with disabilities and their parents and carers in the development of individual education plans for students with disabilities.

We have put together and released to date the most comprehensive funding commitments of any party represented in this Senate—much broader and more detailed than the establishment political parties represented in this place. That is because we do not regard funding education as a cost. We regard it as an investment not only in the future of our country but in the children and the families that have students in our schools today. We are proud to take these policies to the Australian people at this election. We will debate any time anywhere representatives of the establishment parties in this place. We will put up our policies before the Australian people and ask them to give them due consideration as they consider how they are going to vote in the election, which is coming up in a couple of months time.