Page 1497 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 1 June 2022
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That this Assembly:
(1) notes that:
(a) for several years, critical staff shortages in the ACT school system have been noted by teachers, parents and the Australian Education Union;
(b) in 2020, ACT Labor promised 400 new teachers to address the shortage, which had reached critical levels;
(c) the Productivity Commission Report on Government Services shows the ACT Government has, in fact, cut real expenditure per full-time equivalent student in public schools by 3.3 percent during the period 2010-11 to 2019-20;
(d) recent incidents of violence, bullying and assault, which have led to at least one school being closed by WorkSafe ACT and others investigated, have been reported as being “a direct result of the teacher shortage”; and
(e) despite repeated questioning, the minister has been unwilling or unable to provide adequate or complete information on the current situation in the ACT or to clearly identify a plan to recruit and retain the teachers needed to address the crisis; and
(2) calls on the ACT Government to:
(a) provide to the Assembly and the community a detailed, comprehensive report that includes:
(i) the total number of full-time teachers required in the ACT to meet current needs, and projected future needs up to 2028;
(ii) the number of full-time teachers actually in the current system, and how that compares to the required number up to 2028;
(iii) how many teachers have left the ACT system, and how that number affects the net number of teachers currently in the system; and
(iv) the total of actual recruited teachers in the current year, and how that affects the net number of teachers in the system; and
(b) provide a clear plan, with costings and delivery dates, to recruit and retain the teachers to address the crisis in teachers in the ACT, and provide that plan to the Assembly by the first sitting of 2023.
Madam Speaker, I am inspired in a negative way at the start of my speech, having listened to Mr Barr speaking about what he described as a miserable former government. If anyone would understand misery and the ability of a government to inflict misery, it is Andrew Barr and his fellow ministers. Let me tell you how miserable this current government is and how miserable his ministers are.
You can think about how many teachers are not in their schools, either through not being allowed there, because of the violence that occurred at Calwell, or because of the chronic teacher shortage. You can think about the children who have suffered in our schools—and we have seen numerous reports. This Chief Minister, who talked about the misery inflicted by governments, is the Chief Minister who cut 23 schools. If ever there was a minister who inflicted misery on people, it is Andrew Barr, the most miserable minister of the lot!
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