Page 2615 - Week 09 - Wednesday, 8 August 1990
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MR HUMPHRIES: I have had to do it many times, Mrs Grassby. I went to six or seven schools when I was a child. The fact that I have risen to the high post of Minister for Education proves that it involves no damage to one's education.
My colleagues opposite have referred many times to the special education units which the Government has indicated will be moved in the course of this reorganisation. I should emphasise that places like the introductory English centres at Higgins and North Curtin, the hearing impaired unit at Weetangera and other units like that, are not provided for the sole benefit of the schools in which they are presently located. They are regionally based centres, regionally based resources. If it is the case that the particular location in which they find themselves has to change because that location is no longer available, that can be done, and in the course of any given school year they do move about.
As an example, let us take Weetangera school. Had that not been going to close and had there been a surge in enrolments at Weetangera, we might have found that at some point it was not possible to accommodate any further the hearing impaired unit at that school. Had that been the case, the unit would undoubtedly have been moved to another school. I respectfully suggest that that entails no insurmountable burden to those who use that centre because the students who go to that centre come from all over Canberra, some from as far afield as Campbell. Whether those children have to travel from Campbell to Weetangera or Campbell to Hawker or wherever makes almost no difference. (Extension of time granted) Again, I think we grossly underestimate the resilience of our schoolchildren when we make the assertion that these things cannot be coped with. Of course they can.
I also have to firmly repudiate comments made by Mr Wood that no thought has been given to where such and such a unit or such and such a resource might be relocated. That is a gross misrepresentation and should be put paid to right now.
As Minister for Education, I could say that such and such a unit will travel to this school and I do not care what the parents or the students who use that unit think about that. I could say that and I would be able to stand up in this place and answer the questions from the Opposition about where those units could be relocated. That would save me a lot of heartburn because I would be able to say, "This is going here, that is going there" and I would have no problems here.
But the problems would come at the school level. They would come when parents and students attempted to adapt to circumstances which were not ideal. I want to make those decisions based on what those parents and students believe, want and require to the maximum extent possible. So I will
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