Page 3860 - Week 13 - Wednesday, 16 October 1991
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schools have been reopened; I recognise the costs involved. I do not think anyone here should start trading figures on that careful, thoughtful act that has put two schools back in action, partly as a result of the tremendous activities of their school communities.
What we are seeing here, by contrast, is three school communities - two Anglican schools and the AME School - similarly battling for their rights. I applaud them as much as I applaud Lyons and Cook and Weetangera. Weetangera has often been mentioned in this debate. I want to back and support those three schools just as much as I have supported the others. Mr Connolly, I think, does not fully realise my involvement in that matter.
I especially want immediately to say that there is no way in the world that I would argue for the abolition of the AME School, Mr Connolly. One of the very important things about our government and non-government school system is the range of choices, the flexibility, offered. If the AME School represents anything, it is another alternative, and it should very much be supported on that basis.
The Rally is ideologically committed to a complex system of many kinds of schools for many kinds of students and many kinds of families. We support, of course, above all, the concept of, and the reality of, freedom of choice. I want to stress the words "the reality of freedom of choice". It is not good enough to talk rhetorically about freedom of choice; the reality has to be there. It is no good having rights unless it is possible for those rights to be exercised. I notice that tomorrow we are to debate, are we not, the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Bill? I hope the Labor Party will recognise that this is a matter that ought to be of concern in the education debate.
In the case of non-government schools, whether they are denominational, religious or secular, it has to be possible for a family to be able to make that choice to opt for a Catholic, Anglican, Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Quaker or secular education. That choice has to be there. It is no good talking about freedom of choice if you are going to create economic circumstances that take it away from families.
In the case of Quakers then, as an example with which I am comfortable, the Quaker community needs to be in a position to say to every Quaker family, no matter what its economic circumstances, "We want your children to have the right to attend the Friends School in Hobart. It is your choice, without regard to economic constraints". That is very difficult for us. It is a sacrifice, though, that we are bound to make for all members of our community. Similarly, every Catholic family must be able to place children in a Catholic school. Similarly, that should be the case with Anglican families. Anglican families are not any different. The Anglican family at the bottom of the economic margin has to be able to have freedom of choice to go to an Anglican school.
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