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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2001 Week 7 Hansard (21 June) . . Page.. 2404 ..

MR STEFANIAK (continuing):

Mr Berry mentioned the $344 million deficit. He said that a lot of Commonwealth revenue helped us. Commonwealth revenue as a percentage of total revenue from 1995-96 to 1999-2000 decreased from 49 per cent to 44 per cent. Own-source revenue as a percentage of total revenue increased from 51 per cent to 56 per cent. So it does seem that the territory has done a fair bit by itself.

This debate tonight has been quite civilised. Some of the other ones have not been, because members have not given due credit to what the government has done in education. With the election coming, some groups that have given credit in the past are starting to lose sight of the fact that we have increased funding in very difficult financial times. Every single year-this is our seventh budget-the money we spend has gone up, often in a deficit budget situation. As we rightly should, we have given education top priority. In this budget we have seen some very significant increases.

Mr Berry mentioned $91.5 million extra over five years. $40 million of that-I think it is a bit more because, using the Labor figures, there is $3.7 million for minor capital works and actual budget of $7.9 million-is for new initiatives. They speak for themselves. I will read them out:

lower early childhood class sizes for government primary schools K to 2, an initiative worth $25 million over four years;

early childhood support for non-government schools;

support for students at risk through the college action research project on student retention;

methods to monitor attendance and support mechanisms to schools at risk;

planning to assist students at risk of completing education, which builds on High Schools for the New Millennium;

$206,000 this financial year for additional support for students at risk, to increase to $211,000 each year for the outyears;

$700,000 per year for Schools as Communities, starting this year and continuing into the outyears;

the early intervention school management program, allowing government schools to better address student management issues;

expansion of the outer schools education program, rising from $120,000 to $126,000 per annum;

supporting families with adolescents;

youth connection family support;

indigenous youth centre;

recreation support programs for at-risk youth;

support for Learning for Life,

the young carers package;

enhanced literacy and numeracy programs, with $5.7 million per year for the literacy assistance program over and above spending on classroom teaching;

two alternative education programs on the south side and the north side;

additional programs for indigenous students.

There is a very lengthy list of what we are doing for government schooling and there is a further list of additional assistance to the non-government sector. As the Labor Party itself admits, there will some $40 million plus in additional programs over four years.

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