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

What a refreshing change it is that we have a federal government that actually wants to consult and negotiate with states and territories. I think back immediately to the Rudd prime ministership, as to hospital funding, in which he put a gun to the head of all of the states and territories and said: 'In return for some GST money, I will do something; if you do not do it—if you do not sign up—that is the end of you.' Thank the Lord there was one coalition Premier left in this country at the time, in Colin Barnett, who said to Mr Rudd: 'No you won't. The management of hospitals actually resides with the states. And thank you very much for your measly offer!'

But what do we see today? Again, what an incredible scenario, as presented—that the federal government would want to sit down with the states and territories, who have responsibility for the delivery of education in this country, and say to them: 'How can we work better? How can we actually reduce duplication? Is it necessary that we have in excess of 4,000 staff in the federal department of education when they do not actually teach a single child? Is that the best way to expend the taxpayers' money? Is that the best value for children in this country?' It may be or it may not be, but have a look at the manner in which this process is being undertaken.

We heard from Senator Birmingham this afternoon of the South Australian Labor Premier Mr Weatherill complimenting the government and the minister, Minister Pyne, and saying, 'What a refreshing idea it is that we would go through this process.' But I again remind those who might be listening that the provision of education services and delivery in this country, under the Constitution, is for the states.

I know that Senator Cash will be very interested in the comments recently of our state minister for education, Peter Collier, when he made these observations, not 72 hours ago, that, in our state—because Western Australia genuinely believes in provision of education delivery—these are the stats: we have the highest per-capita resourced schools in the nation; our teachers are the best-paid in the nation, and, according to Peter Collier, that is by a country mile.

But let us see the outcome of this, if we can. The trend of reducing attendances in our public state schools in Western Australia has been reversed, and we are now seeing a net increase in the attendance in our public schools. Why do you see that circumstance? There are three words that explain it, and they are: Independent Public Schools. Of the 799 public schools in Western Australia, 441 or 55 per cent of them are now independent public schools and another 92 have applied to join. What are we seeing? We are seeing principals with autonomy in terms of decision making, school communities very much more involved in the management of their school, and principals and their staff and the school community having the capacity to say, 'This is where we want to direct our resources; this is where our particular school needs the educational opportunities,' whether in disability or languages, and, of course, having the capacity to select their staff—to advertise for the teachers that they want. That is what we are seeing in our home state of Western Australia.

In response to the area we speak of, Mr Collier has already come out and said: 'Education is a state based issue; we won't be charging children or their parents to be going to school in the state schools.' So there is the excellence of a system led by a Premier and a minister who put education first.

Indeed, if Senator O'Neill has the long list of complaints and issues that she has got, then she should turn to the state authorities. They have ripped enough of Western Australia's GST money out; they should have sufficient funds to put into education.

But I go to the state of Queensland and to some figures given to me just recently in this debate, and those are on Queensland year 9 NAPLAN tests. And what do we see, Senator O'Sullivan—through you, Mr Acting Deputy President Whish-Wilson? We actually see, at the median SES level, no difference in the NAPLAN performance between state schools, Catholic schools and independent schools. So there are the circumstances.

To return to Western Australia again—because Western Australia and the Territory missed out badly in the last round of negotiations under the previous governments—these are the points I need to make. There are no cuts to Commonwealth government funding, and $69½ billion is to be expended over the forward estimates—and this includes funding for the Indigenous boarding initiative. How wonderful is that? We spoke for years in this place about the limited opportunities being offered through the independent system to take young Aboriginal people from the remote and rural areas and bring them down to the boarding schools—certainly, in my own home state, and, I know, in the other states. Now we have got sufficient funding to expand that program so that these young Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children can get a full education, and the statistics that we saw on the success of that program previously, are of success at year 12 level—the level of going on to higher studies or to education and employment.

The Abbott coalition government—far from all the gloom and doom we heard from Senator O'Neill in this place a few minutes ago—has restored the $1.2 billion that the previous Labor government took out of school funding in the forward estimates. But it is better in our state, which, as Senator Cash well knows, missed out last time. You, Senator Cash—through you, Acting Deputy President—will be interested in these figures. The total Commonwealth funding to government schools in Western Australia will grow by $1.9 billion—a 36 per cent increase from 2014 up to 2018-19. For non-government schools, it will grow by $2.2 billion by 2018, a 23.4 per cent increase. Across the board, it is a 28 per cent increase. No-one who can stand up here and say to me that this Commonwealth government is not totally focused on those three areas. Teacher quality, school autonomy, engaging parents in education and strengthening the curriculum are the four pillars that are so essential in this debate.