Page 1592 - Week 06 - Thursday, 3 May 1990
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
MR WOOD: Let us have some of this out in the open so that we can know what is coming. I do not agree at all with the Government's proposal that we will walk in here one day and discover what is happening.
Mr Kaine: What discussion did your Government have before you took a teacher from Birrigai and closed a couple of ESL classes? Where was the public discussion then?
MR WOOD: I think that this is an appropriate time to make these points. I did not just raise them - - -
MR DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! There is a lot of cross-talk here. Members seem to be having a personal debate.
MR WOOD: Mr Deputy Speaker, I stress that I did not raise those matters just out of the blue. I picked those very carefully because I knew they were areas that had been targeted before. I was quite careful to raise those and I am now quite careful to note that, as a result of discussions, changes were made to original proposals; they were modified. Members of the Government should bear that in mind. I was quite grateful for their interjections.
But let me also say that, when the ALP prepared its budget last year and when it made reductions in education expenditure, it realised that there was no scope for any further significant reductions. Of course, we have to consider the education budget and continue to examine it. But we realised that the quality of education would be severely harmed if any further severe reductions were made. That is our policy today.
People in the ACT value their schools. They have fought hard over many years to establish a truly excellent system. The Government would be wrong if it ignored the facts of history, if it did not know something about the community's expression of support for its education system. I can tell you that that community will continue to assert its intention to retain the high-quality system of education that we are very proud of. The people will see that the Government does nothing that will damage that system; let me assure you of that.
DR KINLOCH (12.04): First of all I note that Mr Humphries is sorry that he cannot be here today, as Mr Wood has indicated. We had expected this debate to be on yesterday but it has come up today. Mr Humphries is at a meeting of education Ministers - including Mr Dawkins - in Melbourne. Indeed, we were discussing this matter yesterday on the way to Erindale College, when the Assembly was discussing the Ainslie tip.
I am sure that many of the questions that Mr Wood has addressed to Mr Humphries will in due time be answered by him. I will certainly deal with some of these points now. I welcome Mr Wood's concern for the quality of education.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .