Michaelia Cash (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister representing the Minister for Education, Senator Carr. Given that the National report on schooling in Australia ranks Western Australian primary school children amongst the worst in reading, writing and maths, does the minister agree that the standards being achieved in Western Australia are unacceptable?

Kim Carr (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Cash for her question. I do not accept the proposition that the senator has advanced today. The simple facts of life are that the Rudd Labor government has been working in partnership with the Carpenter government to deliver an education revolution for Western Australians. The Australian government is working with the Western Australian government to deliver world-class school facilities for 350,000 students studying in both government and non-government schools. The Rudd Labor government has committed $284 million over the next decade to build state-of-the-art trade training centres to service Western Australia’s 335 secondary schools. Fifteen Western Australian schools are amongst the 96 schools nationally who have successfully obtained trade training centre funding in the first round of the program.

Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr President, on a point of order: you cannot direct a minister how to answer a question, but you do have the power to require the minister to sit down or provide some relevance to the issue.

Stephen Conroy (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Conroy interjecting—

Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Talking about trade training schools is all very interesting, but completely and utterly irrelevant to the issue of primary schools, and that is what the minister was asked about. If you were, Mr President, to take up Senator Conroy’s interjection that it is about education, we could have the ridiculous situation of a specific question on primary schools being asked and the minister being allowed to answer in relation to universities. Clearly there must be some relevance to the answer, and I would invite you to direct the minister’s attention to the question.

Joe Ludwig (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Government Business in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On the point of order, Mr President: Senator Abetz again in question time uses the point of order to express a view about the minister answering the question. The minister is answering the question; the minister is relevant to the question. What Senator Abetz then chooses to do is to go on a wide-ranging discourse over issues that he wants to canvass and use the point of order to do that. I think it is impermissible for Senator Abetz to use the point of order in that way, although it has been used, obviously, by him in this way this week. But in this instance I would humbly submit there is no point of order.

John Hogg (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You should not be debating it, Senator Ludwig. I remind all those who take points of order that they are entitled to take a point of order but not to debate the issue at large. That applies to you, Senator Abetz, as much as it applies to Senator Ludwig and others in this chamber. In response to the point of order that Senator Abetz has raised, I would draw the minister’s attention to the question and ask him to address the question now in the two minutes and 41 seconds left.

Kim Carr (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I was asked a question that went to the issue of educational standards in Western Australia. I was asked a question about the success, as I read it, of the Rudd Labor government in working with the Carpenter government to deliver an education revolution for the people of Western Australia. It is disappointing that Senator Abetz has so little understanding of these issues that he finds he has to raise these spurious points of order. If the senators would be interested to know what the government’s position is on national testing, I am only too happy to provide them with further advice.

If you want to talk about the fundamentals—the fundamentals of ensuring equality of opportunity for all children and the fundamentals of ensuring proper participation in our society—then you must talk about a broader set of issues than just the question of benchmark testing. You must also talk about the opportunities for the breadth of the curriculum which this government is providing. This government is providing these services to the people of Western Australia in partnership with the Labor government of Western Australia. As a consequence, the opportunities that are being developed for children in Western Australia are far superior to anything that was offered through the 12 years of the previous government—a government whose record and whose legacy was one of neglect. And it was a clear case that the Liberal government chose to avoid its responsibilities to ensure that every child in this country had the opportunity to participate fully.

Michaelia Cash (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr President, I ask a supplementary question. Is the minister continuing the no-blame game of state and federal Labor or will he acknowledge that the Carpenter government has failed to deliver the education standards that Western Australian children deserve?

Kim Carr (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is a pity that Senator Cash has so little understanding of education, so little understanding of the needs of the people of Western Australia and so little understanding of what actually matters in the paltry attempt to fight the Western Australian election through the Senate. The Australian government is working in partnership with the Western Australian Labor government to deliver world-class school facilities and world-class opportunities for the 350,000 children of Western Australia studying in both government and non-government schools. These are Labor governments—the government here in Canberra and the government in Perth—dedicated to an education revolution, to ensuring that every student has a world-class education. Of course, that is the basis on which we operate. It is a pity that those opposite are so ignorant. (Time expired)