Page 723 - Week 03 - Wednesday, 24 March 1993
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Madam Speaker, dealing flexibly with school closures is precisely what the Alliance Government did in 1990 and 1991. That is exactly what it did. It put forward plans. It made it clear that those plans had to be debated in the broader community. It sat down to the business of working out how those plans should be implemented. As a result of extensive consultation with the community - consultation the Minister has complimented me on in this place on a number of occasions - we saw changes in the Government's plans. That is flexibility. That is what this motion talks about - dealing flexibly with the problem of school closures.
I might say that the community got a lot more in the way of flexibility from the Alliance Government than it did from the Government which, in the last six years, has closed more schools in the ACT than we ever did, namely, the Federal Labor Government that those opposite worked so hard only a week ago to get re-elected. That Government closed six schools, high schools and primary schools, in this Territory in 1987 and 1988 without a whimper from you people opposite. In exactly the same circumstances we attempted to reproduce that no more than a year-and-a-half later and you bleated like sheep because you were not happy with someone else doing it.
The fact of life is that flexibility is essential in these circumstances. Nobody can expect to face these problems without having some degree of flexibility, and the question of fairness and equity must be an integral part of any decision making on our school system. There is no equity or fairness in leaving small schools to struggle on without proper resources. There is nothing fair or equitable about that at all. In fact, social justice cries out against that kind of situation continually. There are small schools in this community now that simply do not have the resources to offer their students a proper range of educational opportunities.
Mr Wood: Not so.
MR HUMPHRIES: That is so, Mr Wood, and that is why Griffith Primary School was bled to death. Parents left that school because they knew that the opportunities were not there. Those small schools, for example, very often cannot offer their students any language training, whereas larger schools can - often in more than one language. What small schools in this Territory offer that language training at present? I know of only one or two. They can often offer only one or two streams in any particular subject - maths or whatever it might be. Sports opportunities are very limited. They simply do not have the range of teachers to teach a number of sporting activities. The stress on teachers in those circumstances is very great.
Mr Berry: How many sports would you like the schools to teach? All of them?
MR HUMPHRIES: No. But one - - -
Mr Berry: One sport per child?
MR HUMPHRIES: No, Mr Berry. But one weekly game of volleyball is hardly adequate training in sport for students in our schools, is it? You are the Minister for Sport. You go to a small school, Mr Berry, and ask them what kinds of sports they are offering to students in that school. I will tell you. They offer only one or two options to the students in those schools. You have shrugged your shoulders. "Who cares?", says Mr Berry. I certainly care.
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