Christopher Back (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am very, very keen to contribute to this debate. Can I start out by saying that my interest is in the education of children across the nation. In 2011 I instigated, with the authority of the Senate, a select committee inquiry into teaching and learning in Australia. On that committee, of course, was Senator Marshall, Senator Penny Wright and Senator McKenzie. This was at the time Gonski was being examined, and it was not an inquiry into the high-level Gonski macro. It was an inquiry into: why aren't teachers teaching and why aren't children learning?

We did a lot of good work on the selection of people going into teacher training; the quality of teacher training programs; the amount of practicum that they had in there; whether they were classed as ready, because we learnt that more than 50 per cent of new teachers were not ready; what the levels of mentoring were; what the involvement of parents was from the youngest age; professional development, of course; and teachers who were being asked to teach out of their level of expertise et cetera. Discipline was an incredibly important position.

At the same time, we visited China. We met with them in Beijing, Shanghai and Chengdu. Of course, I am familiar with the situation in Singapore and Finland. In each of those three jurisdictions student discipline in classrooms is not an issue, because the children are disciplined and the teachers teach. What was very interesting at that time was that, whilst money was important, we had doubled the expenditure of funds in our education system, yet our standards had gone down. I said to them in Shanghai, 'Maybe it's the nature of the international comparator that is being used.' They said, 'It was developed in Melbourne, so, if you're not happy with it, go back and have a look at it yourselves.'

I put on the record that I have a vital interest in the education of all children in this country. Also, I will just comment on the government-funding sector. I have no difficulty with the amendments as I have seen them in the legislation, because under the Constitution the teaching of children in government schools is a state responsibility. If, indeed, the minister is going to move to a commonality over time whereby the federal government contributes 20 per cent and the states contribute 80 per cent—and I can see that in the amendments there are provisions to make sure, whether it be government schools support or private schools support, that the state and territory governments continue to commit at least to that level—then I applaud that.

I now want to go to discussions relating to the Catholic education system, about which I have most experience. Also, in my time in this place, I have been particularly interested in the independent schools system and their contribution. I was on the Catholic Education Commission for nine years in the mid-eighties to the mid-nineties. I was on a country school board when this so-called concept of co-responsibility was first mooted. Of course, being from the bush, I immediately thought, 'This is a grab by the rich city schools against the country schools.' I then went to see the then head of Catholic Education, Dr Peter Tannock, whose name will come up again in a few minutes, and Mr Mike Beacham. I jumped up and down and carried on such treat that they said to me, 'The only way to shut you up and to have you understand that co-responsibility is about the wealthier schools supporting the poorer schools is to put you on the commission, and then you yourself can be the overall auditor.' So I became the parent member of the commission. I have even had somebody in email traffic to me in the last couple of days saying that I have a conflict of interest and I have been corrupt. How a parent member of the commission, who is there at a totally voluntary capacity, can be corrupt, I do not know. What I did come to learn, of course, was that the co-responsibility concept and the funding became critical.

I then moved to the board of Santa Maria College, where both my wife and daughter had been at school. I was about to call them 'old girls' but, as Senator Moore knows very well, you would never call them old girls—you would call them past students. Why I had to go onto the Santa Maria board, and not Linda, I will never know. Anyhow, there were only three schools that did not come aboard initially. One was Aquinas College, a Christian Brothers college, where I had been at school. The other one was Santa Maria, where I was on the board, and the third was John XXIII, which had been the Jesuits' St Louis and Loreto. I guess I had a bit of influence in those colleges coming on board.

What has been very interesting over time has been the absolute strength—I can speak with a lot of authority about Western Australia—I cannot speak much, although I have engaged in this process, as others know, in terms of the Senate inquiry, and I made it my business to spend a lot of time recently with the South Australians to understand it. There are a couple of points that I want people who might be listening to this conversation this evening to understand. I understand that my colleague Senator Hinch the other day said that I ought to get on my bike and leave because the only funding that ever should come from governments is to government schools. I want to comment on that.

The first point I want to make is—and maybe the independents are included in this—the cost of educating a child in a Catholic school in Australia is 90 per cent of that of educating a child in a government school. Remember that—90 per cent. The second point is that the Catholic system enjoys, as a benefit from the Commonwealth, which is vitally important, about the cost of the teachers' salaries. That is about the contribution that the Commonwealth pays to Catholic schools. But it is the parents, through fees and the co-responsibility system, that actually meet the balance of those costs. The day-to-day costs of running the school—the water, the electricity, the maintenance and all those other costs—are met by parents' fees. The next point I want to make is that where a child in a government school walks into a new school, that has been totally funded by the taxpayers of Australia, of whom many are the parents of Catholic children—remembering that 30 per cent of children in Catholic schools are not Catholic. That government school has been fully funded by government, whether it is state or federal. By contrast, 95 per cent of the capital cost of building Catholic schools in this country is paid by the parents. So Senator Hinch, if that is what you did say, be very pleased that Catholic parents and independent parents are paying up, because for everyone who is in a Catholic or independent school that capital cost of building the school, that extra 10 per cent of the cost of running the school and educating the child has been met by that Catholic or independent parent on top of paying their taxes.

When you think about the passion of it, think that in some of those schools, like St Benedict's in Applecross, where my children went to school, it is only last year that the last of the classrooms that were built by the parents in the 1950s under the direction of the builder Cyril Wildy were knocked down and replaced. So when I talk about a bit of passion, I remember bottle drives as a kid in Bunbury, I remember planting the lawn on the oval at the Marist Brothers in Bunbury on Saturdays and Sundays on our hands and knees. We were not praying and we were not getting any indulgences from upstairs, but I can tell you that if we wanted an oval we planted that oval.

I want to make the point that that is how critically important all of this is. Co-responsibility supports poorer schools. You have heard these allegations that it is just a grab by the rich schools against the poor schools. In my state, under the current system weighted average every child in a Catholic school has a grading of 103, and more than 50 per cent of the funding supporting kids below the 103 comes from the kids above the 103.

Just a couple of small things. Rent in Karratha went to $2,400 a week. When it came to the state school, the state government just paid for the extra rent in rent support. When it came to the Catholic school, how do you keep the teachers in the schools in Karratha?

The co-responsibility fund pays for it. At Roxby, in South Australia, they had to provide a home for the principal. It cost them a million bucks. Could they go back to government and say, 'Look, it has cost us a million'? In South Australia, when electricity and water costs went up in recent times, the state schools were supported; but the Catholic education system pays for the middle. In the north of WA, in the Kimberley; in the Northern Territory, as Senator McCarthy would know; and in North Queensland there are many small communities where the only school is the Catholic school. If you close it, there is not a school. And who has the challenge then?

In Australia, choice has always been an element. One of the fears that I have—and it has been put to me—is that the very essence of the Catholic school system in this country has been the education of poor children. Mary MacKillop started in Penola. The Mercys came to Fremantle in January 1846, having come out of Tipperary in Ireland to the stinking January heat. Within 20 days, they were not only opening a school for girls but the first ever school for Aboriginal girls in Australia. That is the quality of the Catholic education system and that has to be preserved.

The last point I want to make before I go to specific questions is about transparency. We in this place, as lawmakers, need to know that every last dollar of taxpayers' money has been accounted for and has been spent on the purpose for which, quite rightly, the taxpayers of Australia have given it. I just want to make the point very strongly that that is an element that must continue.

I now want to come to the concept of the system weighted average. As you all know, I have jumped up and down publicly about it and said please continue it for at least one year. I will tell you why. I will quote a letter from Dr Peter Tannock. He was head of Catholic Education originally and then he became Vice-Chancellor at Notre Dame. He is a very active member of Gonski. In a letter just the other day he said: 'The government should ameliorate the concerns of Catholic systems and should reinstate the longstanding mechanism for Commonwealth funding of Catholic and other non-government systems—for example, Lutherans—and it should be based on the enrolment weighted average of all schools.' He refers to a recommendation at page 171 of the original Gonski report. He goes on to say: 'This funding mechanism was strongly and unanimously endorsed by Gonski'—and that should make it very acceptable. I understand that Professor Farish was asked to examine and create what was supposedly to be the new SES model—and even Farish has said it is not working. The Grattan Institute, as has been said earlier this evening, has also come out and said the same thing. That is the reason why I have pushed very hard for there to be a pause, for there to be a continuation of the system weighted average for a 12-month period, including an examination of the funding for students with disabilities—because that is a real area of concern right across the board, as the minister well knows. And, during that time, maybe it might be led by Professor Farish.

I can imagine a situation where that review is chaired by the person who was the original architect of the new SES model. It would have tax office people on board. It would have census and statistics people—a representation of the systems—so they can have a good long hard look based on capacity to pay. That might be through the tax file numbers of the parents in the schools. I am sure that, with modern technology, we can crossmatch those. The simple fact is that, if you do not earn $18,800 a year, you do not pay tax. So the possibility of examining it through tax returns might or might not work. We need something or other that can be examined. Minister, can you point to what you have in mind to allow the continuation of the system weighted average? What do you have in mind in terms of how that review will be undertaken? Can I have an undertaking from you that disability will be included in that particular process?

Naturally, at the conclusion of that review, since I will not be here, I want to be absolutely sure that my colleagues across the chamber will be able to know what it was that the review panel determined. If, indeed, it is one of your requirements that consensus be reached, well, send them all on a long drive to Darwin, because by the time they get there they will as sure as hell have consensus. I really do want to know what mechanism will be in place, whatever the determination the review panel make and whatever the recommendation they make to you as the minister, and how that will find its way into our processes. Of course, as has been quite rightly asked by Senator Collins: is there some indicative costing, additional costing, that you believe would be required to give effect to this so that there can be a level of satisfaction across systems, it is understood and we can go forward into 2018.

We cannot leave it any longer, colleagues. There are those who say, 'Can we put this off until August or September?' However, those of us who have been on school boards know that by now you have normally done your budgets. You know what your enrolments are for next year. You know whether there are going to be more teachers or fewer teachers. You are trying to work out what the fee structures are going to be. June is late enough. For those of us who know the system, who know how school boards run, know that to delay the determination until August or September is far too late for 2018. Anybody associated with budgeting is screaming now. They are the questions I want answered. The minister knows that, if I can be satisfied, of course I can support it.