Malarndirri McCarthy (NT, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Indigenous Australians) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That these bills be now read a second time.

I seek leave to have the second reading speeches incorporated in Hansard.

Leave granted.

The speeches read as follows—

BETTER AND FAIRER SCHOOLS (FUNDING AND REFORM) BILL 2024

This is a Bill to increase funding for our public schools. The Minister for Education is proud of public education. Education is the most powerful cause for good in this country. It doesn't just change lives. Its impact ricochets through generations. It changes communities and it changes countries. It's changed ours. And it's public education that does most of that heavy lifting.

More than 6,700 public primary and high schools across the country. Full of children from every background, every religion and every culture. And mums and dads up and down the income scale. Doing every sort of job. That's part of what makes public education special. It is for everyone.

But it also does something else. It plays an outsized role in educating the most disadvantaged children in this country. The children who are most likely to start behind or fall behind. The children who need our help the most. And these are the schools that are the most underfunded.

One in 10 children today are below the minimum standards we set for literacy and numeracy. But one in three children from poor families are below that standard. Most of those children are in our public schools. Many never catch up. And many never finish school.

Over the last eight years the percentage of students finishing high school has gone down not up. From 85 percent to 79 percent. That drop isn't happening everywhere. In non government schools the percentage of students finishing school is either pretty flat or going up. Where the drop is happening is in our public schools. From 83 percent to 73 percent. And it's happening at a time when it's more important to finish school than ever before. Where more and more jobs require you to finish school and then get a qualification from TAFE or uni.

This is what we have got to turn around. This is what we have got to fix. And this is what this legislation is about.

In 2011 David Gonski delivered the report that recommended a new funding formula for schools. What we now call the Schooling Resource Standard—or SRS. The SRS sets the estimated level of total public funding each school should receive to fund the cost of schooling each year. At the moment, the base per student amount is $13,570 for a child in primary school and $17,053 for a child in high school.

As part of the model that David Gonski recommended, additional funding is also provided for:

These are called loadings.

For most non-government schools, the base per student amount is reduced depending on the median income of the parents of the children who attend the school. This means for example that at a non-government school where the median family income of the parents is very high the school only gets 20 percent of the SRS base amount.

All of this is what's often described as the Gonski model or needs-based funding. At the moment all non-government schools are funded at the level David Gonski set all those years ago, or they are on track to get there, or they are above it and coming back down to it. But most public schools aren't.

The Commonwealth Government provides 80 percent of the SRS funding for non government schools and the State and Territory Governments provide the other 20 percent. For public schools it's the reverse. The Commonwealth provides 20 percent of the SRS funding and the States and Territories are supposed to provide another 75 percent.

Some do. Some don't. That means there is at least a five percent gap. At the last election the Labor party promised "to work with all states and territories to get all public schools on a path to 100 per cent of the SRS." What that means is both the Commonwealth Government chipping in more and the States and Territories chipping in more to fill that gap. To do that we have to amend the Australian Education Act.

At the moment, the Act says the Commonwealth Government will provide a maximum 20 percent of the Schooling Resource Standard to public schools. This Bill turns that maximum amount into a minimum. It turns that ceiling into a floor. It enables the Commonwealth government to ratchet up funding for public schools. And it makes it harder for future governments to rip that money out.

It means that when the Commonwealth government does a deal with a State or Territory to increase funding to public schools, that bigger Commonwealth share becomes the new floor for that State or Territory. It is locked in and it can't go backwards without changes to the Act. We have done three of those deals so far this year. With Western Australia, with the Northern Territory and Tasmania. All of them involve the Commonwealth government chipping in more and the State and Territory governments chipping in more. All of them mean more funding from 1 January next year.

In the case of Western Australia it means every public school there will be fully funded by 1 January 2026, just over 12 months away. In the case of Tasmania it means every public school will be fully funded by no later than 2029. And in the case of the Northern Territory it means something that promises to be truly transformational.

At the moment Northern Territory public schools receive approximately 80 percent of the funding they are supposed to get under the Gonski model. Less than anywhere else in the country. It means in effect that one in five children in the Northern Territory are not receiving any funding. The agreement the Minister for Education signed this year fixes that. It doubles the Commonwealth's investment in public schools in the Northern Territory. It brings forward the day that all Northern Territory public schools are fully funded by more than 20 years. And it means that some of the most disadvantaged public schools in this country will now be some of the best funded.

To make this happen though we need to pass this Bill.

There are some people who say that funding isn't important. We just need practical reforms. And there are others who say the opposite. The truth is both are required. Funding and reform.

As David Gonski said in his report: "resources alone will not be sufficient to fully address Australia's schooling challenges and achieve a high quality, internationally respected schooling system. The new funding arrangements must be accompanied by continued and renewed efforts to strengthen and reform Australia's schooling system."

The Minister for Education agrees. That's why the agreements the government has struck with Western Australia, Tasmania and the Northern Territory are not a blank cheque. They are tied to real, practical reforms. That includes:

All of this is part of the Better and Fairer Schools Agreement that the Commonwealth and the States and Territories have developed together. It also includes targets and measures to make sure this money glows in the dark.

The Minister for Education wants parents and teachers to know where this funding is going. That's why the bill and the Agreement strengthens the reporting and public transparency requirements around how taxpayer funding is invested, without placing additional burden on schools. The Agreement includes requirements for States and Territories to outline how the additional money is being invested in the key reform areas, and a new public reporting dashboard. And the Bill includes a new annual Ministerial statement to the Australian Parliament on the progress of school education reform agreements.

This is important reform. But it is just one part of the reforms we need to make to make our education system better and fairer. We need to reform higher education too. That's what the Australian Universities Accord is about. It's a blueprint print for reform to higher education over the next ten years and beyond. What it says is we need to build a workforce by the middle of the century where 80 percent of working aged people have a TAFE qualification or a university degree. And the only way to do that it says, is to help more people from poor families and more people from regional Australia get to university and help them succeed once they get there.

We also have to reform early education. That's what the Productivity Commission's report that was released on 18 September 2024 is about. What it says is that it's these same children, children from poor families, from the regions, from disadvantaged backgrounds, who are the least likely to go to child care or pre-school, and the most likely to benefit from it. And this, what the government is doing here, is the critical piece in the middle.

Helping those same children who start behind or fall behind, to catch up, keep up and help more children finish school. What the Prime Minister calls opening the door of opportunity.

A country where no one is held back and no one is left behind. That at its core is what public education is about. What it has always been about. That's what this Bill is about. If you support lifting funding for our public schools you will support this Bill.

I commend it to the Chamber.

WAGE JUSTICE FOR EARLY CHILDHOOD EDUCATION AND CARE WORKERS (SPECIAL ACCOUNT) BILL 2024

Every day, parents trust early educators with the most important people in their world. And every day, Australia asks early educators to do one of the most important jobs imaginable. And they deserve a pay rise. That's what this bill helps deliver. A 15 per cent pay rise for up to 200,000 child care workers. A 10 per cent pay rise from December and then a further 5 per cent pay rise from the following December.

This is important. Because what happens in early education and care centres is important. It isn't babysitting. It's early education.

90 per cent of brain development occurs in the first five years of life. Everything that you see, everything that you read, every meal, every smile, shapes and makes the people that we become.

The US President often makes the point that if a child goes to preschool, they're 50 per cent more likely to go to college or university. That's why this is so important. It's about this. And it's about respect.

Early educators have been asking for this for decades.

And the Productivity Commission has told us that if we're going to build a universal early education system which makes early education affordable and available for more families, the first thing we need to do is this. There are 30,000 more early educators working in the sector today than when we came to office.

But we need more.

And this pay rise will help encourage more people to stay, more people to come back and more people to think about becoming an early educator. And more educators means more children and more parents can benefit from the life-changing work they do.

This bill sets up the Wage Justice for Early Childhood Education and Care Workers Special Account. This Account allows us to deliver a 15 per cent pay rise over two years through the ECEC Worker Retention Payment Program.

Let me put that in real terms. It means a typical early educator, paid at the award rate, will receive a pay rise of at least $103 per week, in December this year, increasing to at least $155 per week from next year. That's around $7,800 a year. A typical early childhood teacher will receive an additional $166 a week from December this year, increasing to $249 from next year.

People who are thinking 'I love this job, but I can't afford to do it' will think 'well, now I can.' And people who've left the job to go and work at, maybe the local supermarket think 'I can go back to doing the job I love.' And, hopefully, it will encourage more people to want to be an early educator.

The CEO of Australia's largest early education provider, Goodstart, Ros Baxter said:

"We expect that [this] announcement will see qualified early learning educators return to our sector, while encouraging others to establish a career in early learning. This in turn will help make more quality child-care places available for families who need it."

Community Early Learning CEO, Michele Carnegie:

"We expect this announcement will entice many qualified staff back into the sector. Families will see more places available and children will benefit from greater consistency of care."

Early Childhood Australia CEO, Sam Page said:

"This is a well overdue pay increase, and I am thrilled that the Government has acknowledged the professionalism of our educators during Early Learning Matters Week, where so many politicians have been out seeing first-hand the great work the early childhood sector does. Early childhood educators play a crucial role in the learning and development of young children, and this recognition is a significant step towards valuing their contributions appropriately."

Early educator, Karen Moran, who the Minister for Education recently met, said:

"this decision ...will change people's lives. It means that early childhood educators who've been relying on Foodbank to feed their own families won't have to do that anymore. And those that work two and three jobs just to make ends meet will be able to spend more time with their families. It's also about the recognition, which is so well deserved."

This legislation doesn't just deliver a pay rise for early educators. It also delivers cost of living relief for parents and carers. As a condition of funding the wage increase, early education and care centres will not be allowed to increase their fees by a set amount over the grant period, with that amount set at 4.4 per cent up until August 2025. That's informed by the work the ACCC has been doing with the government—a combination of the wage price index and the consumer price index. That condition will be set out in a legally enforceable agreement between the Department of Education and providers.

Capping fee increases provides certainty to families and will keep a lid on fee growth. It also builds on our Cheaper Child Care changes. The changes that the government has already made have cut the cost of child care for more than 1 million families. Those changes that began in July last year means a family on a combined income of $120,000 today is now paying about $2,000 less in childcare fees than they otherwise would have had to.

This is also the next step in building the universal early education system that we want to create. Making it more accessible and more affordable for more children and more families. We need to reform our entire education system—to make it better and make it fairer. To help more people finish school and go to TAFE or university. But that reform doesn't just need to happen in our schools or our TAFEs or our universities. It has to happen here as well. And this is a big part of that. Helping to build a bigger early education and care workforce to help build a bigger and better early education system.

The Minister for Education thanks the Prime Minister, the Treasurer and the Minister for Finance. Their leadership has made this possible. The Minister for Education especially acknowledges the work the Minister for Early Childhood Education for her unyielding work here and for everything she is doing to build a better and a fairer early education system.

And finally, the Minister for Education thanks all the early educators across Australia who do this vital work. You deserve wage justice. You deserve this pay rise. You deserve this bill.

I commend it to the Chamber.

Debate adjourned.

Ordered that the bills be listed on the Notice Paper as separate orders of the day.