Joanne Ryan (Lalor, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

No; someone else did. The member for Nicholls needs to understand that he wants a magic wand to fix student behaviour and he wants the Commonwealth to magically find this magic wand. I'll tell you what happens, with student behaviour: hard graft, professional teaching and learning, people committed to a profession and committed to student outcomes—that's what the magic bullet is. It's really, really complex, and no-one sitting on the benches in this place with no experience should be suggesting that they know the answers to these questions. They can consult, but one day as principal for a day does not make anyone in this place an expert on education or on schools.

From preps through to year 12, we have committed teachers walking into classrooms. They need to be respected for their professionalism. People in this place need not to tell them how to do their jobs; they need to ask what supports they need to make them better at their jobs. That's what places like the federal parliament should be busy investing in. In terms of the OECD and the outcomes, the fundamental thing that the conservative government missed in all of this debate is that, in schools where there isn't a chasm in funding between private and public, they're performing better. But you don't want to hear that, you don't want to see that evidence, and you don't want to understand what it means.

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