Michael Danby (Melbourne Ports, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Labor does not agree with the government's education changes or the proposals for spending $22 billion less over the long term on education. But the thing that has surprised me about this budget and the doubling down by ministers, such as Minister Pyne and Minister Birmingham, is their attack on and cuts to an unexpected target: the Catholic education system.

Today, there was what I can only describe as a sectarian attack against one of my local Catholic schools—a beloved local school, St Columba's, where we always have our Anzac Day masses—in The Age. Outrageously, they were claiming on the front page of The Age today, obviously with a briefing from the education minister, that St Columba's was making a 'windfall' of $200,000! A 'windfall'! Some bishops were probably going to consume this in some huge feast for prelates! Rubbish! Nonsense, The Age newspaper! The Catholic system knows far more about their parish schools than education minister Simon Birmingham or Minister Pyne do.

They know how people in electorates in the Catholic community choose their schools. This school, St Columba's, might be taking more refugees or more poor people, or people on health cards who are in our area. Therefore, within its budgeting, the Catholic system has decided to support it.

I was speaking to the Catholic Education Office in Victoria today. They pointed out to me that 210,000 students from 140,000 families attend one of the 500 Catholic schools in Victoria statewide. That is one in four Victorian children. Catholic schools pride themselves on the quality of the education they provide and they refer to their values based education. It is a distinction that many parents look for when they select a Catholic school to send their children to.

There are five Catholic primary schools in my electorate, and these cuts to their funding will affect the quality and availability of education to the residents of Melbourne Ports, despite the false claims—indeed, the infamous claims—in The Age that they are making windfalls from a falsely projected number that the federal education minister has given without any understanding of the local circumstances that govern these schools.

I know this because in the Jewish schools in the area we have exactly the same problem. They have a higher SES rating because Caulfield, for instance, is a relatively wealthy suburb. But for a couple of the schools in my electorate, the people from the whole electorate—the poor ones—decide to go to a couple of schools because they are supported, in this case by the Catholic education system and, in the case of the Jewish schools, by the community in general.

A decrease in funding will result in these schools cutting programs from their curriculum and reducing class sizes. A representative of the Catholic Education Office in Melbourne told my office just today that schools in the local parish will be forced to lift fees by $5,000 a year. That is over $100 a week under Malcolm Turnbull's and Simon Birmingham's plan. Catholic constituents in my electorate simply cannot afford this increase in school fees. Many of the families have several children attending school.

Of course, it was not always this way. At the last federal election, the coalition committed to an increase of funding to Catholic schools by 3.5 per cent to six per cent per student each year from 2018. Now it would appear that the only increases will be in the school fees forced on already struggling families.

Catholic Education Melbourne explained to us today that calculations indicate a funding cut of about $25 million in real terms for Catholic schools in Victoria in the first year, increasing by $25 million each year after that: $25 million in 2021, $50 million in 2022, $75 million in 2023 and so on. These cuts to Catholic schools will impact the education of children as they will force schools to find savings to cover the Turnbull funding cuts.

There is a wonderful principal at St Aloysius, Therese Stewart, in my electorate, who says, 'My school needs to know what the government is going to do.' She urges the minister to meet with leaders of Catholic Education to— (Time expired)