Deborah O'Neill (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to make a contribution to the short debate today about the Australian Education Amendment (Direct Measure of Income) Bill 2020. The changes proposed in this bill implement the recommendations of the independent National School Resourcing Board to move to a more accurate direct measure of income to calculate a school community's capacity to contribute to the funding of non-government schools. Labor believe that government funding for schools should always be guided first and foremost by need. When we were last in government we committed to hold a review of the SES funding model to find out if it was still the best measure for allocating funding. The move to a direct measure of parents' income should be a more accurate, robust and reliable way to determine parents' capacity to contribute to the cost of their child's education and it should allow funding to be targeted at more-needy non-government schools.

This bill, I'm sad to say, is another example of a missed opportunity for this government to deliver fair, genuine needs based funding to public schools. This legislation shows once again that the Liberal-National government has turned its back on every public school parent and child in Australia, by refusing to properly fund public schools. The government will spend $3.4 billion to deliver targeted needs based funding to private schools but it refuses to provide a single extra dollar for underfunded public schools. Some 2.5 million students go to public schools—two in three of all Australian students. The Prime Minister and his government continue to show that they think that the learning of those students who go to public schools—your sons and daughters, your children—somehow matters less than that of the daughters and sons of other Australians. Public schools educate 82 per cent of the poorest kids in Australia. They teach 84 per cent of Indigenous kids and 74 per cent of kids with disabilities too.

This Liberal-National government show that they actually believe that they should give the greatest resource to those who have the most and the least resource to those who have the least. The Liberal Party seem to think that it's fine to provide public schools with only 20 per cent of the schooling resource standard while it is committed to giving private schools 80 per cent. This government's model of school funding locks in disadvantage and it will stop the funding gap between public and private schools from ever closing. As the Australian Education Union stated in its submission to the Senate inquiry on this bill:

The government's 20% cap on commonwealth funding of public schools will ensure that a tiny minority will reach 100% of SRS by 2023, whereas … the Commonwealth Government's promise to deliver 80% of SRS to private schools by 2023 will mean that the vast majority of private schools in Australia will exceed 100% of SRS …

This is baking in difference and disadvantage in the most appalling way, which is coming to characterise this Liberal-National government.

The government's funding arrangements also include loopholes that allow states to underfund public schools by a further four per cent by artificially counting as part of recurrent expenditure the funding of items such as capital depreciation and school transport costs. For those who are listening or watching: that means that they count what it costs to send your child on a bus to school as part of the funding of your child's education. That is what this government has allowed to happen. The government's funding arrangements, despite their claims, are not needs based. The government have entrenched inequity between school systems, turning their backs on public school students and parents. This bill does nothing to address the underfunding of public schools. Instead, it commits an additional $3.4 billion to deliver targeted funding to private schools.

Australia is facing a long-term decline in our students' reading, mathematics and science skills. In 2018 Australia recorded its worst results in reading, maths and science since international testing began. In maths, 15-year-olds performed more than a year below those in 2000, a year lower in reading than those in 2000 and a year worse in science than those in 2006. By these measures, we are currently preparing a future workforce less equipped than it was 20 years ago.

This decline in school performance has worrying implications for long-term economic growth, with a one per cent change in literacy associated with a 2.5 per cent change in labour productivity. There are also major disparities within classrooms and schools, with the most advanced students in a year typically five to six years ahead of the least advanced students. Children who have not mastered the basics by the age of eight struggle to catch up for the rest of their schooling. But this Liberal-National government have no plan to reverse the shocking drop in student outcomes and they refuse to properly fund public schools.

I want to make a couple of short remarks to the context that we find our schools facing today. Teachers are incredible professionals. Making learning happen for every child in your classroom—every child who comes into your care—is not an easy thing to do. I stand here proudly as a teacher who was educated in this country and has taught in this country, and I speak to and for my colleagues in the teaching profession about the incredible anxiety and the sense of disrespect that they feel currently for their very important profession. Confusion reigns in the area of education because there is a failure of leadership.

In the coming months that lie ahead I want to give every encouragement to all of the teachers who have been doing their very best in the very complex situation in which they are very concerned about their own health and wellbeing and that of their families and students. I want the teachers of Australia to know that the parliament recognises your important contributions. For parents who are on the cusp of taking over the education of their own sons and daughters, I encourage you to continue your contact with the professionalism that's offered by teachers. They will do the very best they can to assist you while you make decisions about where it is best for your child to continue their education.

The government's decision in this bill to include amendments that provide authority to make the GST-inclusive payments to non-government schools that are prevented through scrutiny of this bill cut short the time that's available for the Senate inquiry and fast-tracked the legislation through the parliament. The reality is that, if the changes aren't passed promptly, thousands of schools doing the right thing stand to lose longstanding GST payments. Labor will not allow that to happen. However, attaching this time-sensitive amendment to a bill that proposes major changes to recurrent school funding, with such a limited opportunity for detailed scrutiny of the proposed changes, is an example of this government's failure to govern ethically, with care and with genuine leadership. This has compounded concerns, expressed by a number of submitters, that the government development of the direct-measure-of-income methodology has been rushed and has relied on far too limited a consultation.

A number of submissions suggest that a significant proportion of the related Choice and Affordability Fund will go towards assisting schools to transition as a result of the introduction of the DMI CTC methodology. Labor notes that transition funding should support schools to transition to their accurate funding level, not top up or sustain their existing funding in perpetuity. Labor calls on the government to clarify whether funding under the Choice and Affordability Fund will be allocated across all five priorities identified in the relevant guidelines. A number of schools in regional Australia have raised concerns that this bill unfairly disadvantages families at their particular schools. Their concerns have, thus far, fallen on deaf ears. Labor supports the Australian Bureau of Statistics, a department undertaking further investigation of ways to improve the quality of data and appropriateness of the methodology in these cases.

The bill, as currently drafted, allows the minister discretion to change a school's capacity-to-contribute score and, therefore, the amount of funding they receive, either by his or her own initiative or on application by the school. Where there are genuine issues with a school's capacity-to-contribute score matching the demographics of its community, this is appropriate. However, ministerial discretion should not provide a blank cheque to top up the funding of any school just because they request it—and, given this government's record on personal favours attached to funding, we should watch this very, very carefully.

The shadow minister for education has negotiated an agreement with the government to amend the regulation enabled by this bill to strengthen transparency around the appeal process and ministerial determinations on the CTC scores. The minister has agreed to amend the regulation to require that information on the outcome of appeals and own-initiative ministerial determinations is published on the Department of Education, Skills and Employment website within 30 days of a determination being made. The government will publish details of the school, the change to their CTC score, the year and period of determination, and the grounds for change. We thank the minister for his cooperation on this important improvement.

Notwithstanding concerns regarding the scrutiny and transparency of this bill, Labor accepts that the proposed arrangements will deliver a more robust, direct and accurate measure of a school community's capacity to contribute to the financial operation of the school. This will lead to the delivery of more targeted funding within the non-government school sector. Labor will, therefore, support this bill.