Page 2824 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 14 August 1990
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very hard to give our children the best we can - a maths centre and a science room with access to computers and a remedial reading program.
I think Mr Humphries is ignoring this kind of community involvement in their local school that is obviously of great importance, not just to the parents of children there but to the children themselves and, of course, to the staff of those schools. In this whole debate one group that has been totally ignored is the staff, and their need to have their professionalism recognised, their need for some stability in their workplace and their need to have consideration given to them while you are closing schools around their ears.
They have a stake in these schools and they have just been cut out of the whole debate, it seems to me. The writers of this particular letter go on to say that they feel that even though their school is small it has a right to exist because the Government is leaving smaller schools open. They have urged that members do all they possibly can to make this irresponsible Government reverse its decision.
That letter is typical of many that I have received. In the few seconds left to me I would like to refer to another letter from the Weetangera school which I think demonstrates - if any further demonstration were needed - that Mr Humphries is just not getting through to the community that he is supposed to be serving. This is a very recent letter from a person associated with Weetangera school. It says:
I welcome the recent announcement by the Minister for Education, Mr Humphries, to review their decision.
This referred to the decision to close Weetangera school. Now it seems to me that what Mr Humphries has announced is that he may possibly review his decision to review the decision about closing Weetangera school. Obviously he has given false hope to the Weetangera people and I think that he should communicate with them much more clearly.
School Closures
MR WOOD (9.46): Mr Speaker, the Government is clearly embarrassed by the continuing debate on education. It wishes that it would just go away but I can tell Government members it is not going to go away. The Minister has to date carefully avoided - judiciously avoided - debating the issue. He has only a couple of stock answers that he keeps regurgitating but he has never seriously debated the matters at issue point by point. He cannot do that because he simply does not have the arguments in his hands, in his head or even in his heart. The Minister made a snap decision - and you all know that. You know it. He made a snap decision some months ago, about March - - -
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