Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .

Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 04 Hansard (Tuesday, 30 March 2004) . . Page.. 1329 ..

Clause 28.

MR PRATT (6.09): I move amendment No 11 circulated in my name [see schedule 3 at page 1376]. Mr Speaker, this amendment makes religious education available in all government schools. The Liberal opposition believes that students should learn about the history of religions and the fundamental foundations and building blocks formed through time of the different religions of this world. We do not mean that specific religious beliefs should be taught to, imposed upon or imparted to students, but that basic religious history should be taught as part of a social science curriculum in government schools and in other schools. This surely is a powerful strategy for teaching tolerance and understanding of other cultures and their sometimes intertwined religions, particularly in these increasingly troubled times.

MS GALLAGHER (Minister for Education, Youth and Family Services, Minister for Women and Minister for Industrial Relations) (6.10): The government will not be supporting this amendment. Again, it is Mr Pratt trying to allege that there are failings in the government system in relation to curriculum, particularly around values education, tolerance, inclusivity and understanding people from different backgrounds, and that is what he is using to justify this amendment. May I say that nothing is further from the truth. Issues surrounding religion are a common component of a wide variety of subjects including literature, language, culture and history. In these, students are taught about the principles of inclusivity, tolerance and respect for all people from all backgrounds. By definition, secular education is education without reference to any specific religion. To require that secular education be defined in the bill as necessarily including the study of religion is simply nonsense. Mr Pratt can continue to go on about the failures of the government system in relation to values. He will not win and he will not win any support for it, so I suggest that he just stop.

MR STANHOPE (Chief Minister, Attorney-General, Minister for Environment and Minister for Community Affairs) (6.11): I would like to contribute on this point in the same vein as the minister has. I noticed just now Mr Pratt’s public assertion on the WIN television news that the great failing of this legislation is that it does not address the lack of values within the government school sector in the ACT.

Mr Pratt might simply be echoing the mantra of his federal leader but I think that, having regard to the standing of public education Australia wide and particularly in the ACT, to have the would-be minister for education—the person responsible for marshalling, supporting and nurturing public education in the ACT—publicly advocating, publicly articulating, as the Liberal Party view of public education in the ACT that the public sector, the public schools and teachers within the public sector, do not impart to students within that sector appropriate values is nothing less than shameful. It is a shameful defamation of every teacher and every worker within the public system.

It is a shameful slur on all schools, on all students and the parents who support the public education system and sector in the ACT. It is just simple, and shallow and mindless politics to stand up and bray and berate public education as a system that does not support values of any sort. There is this throwaway line: “The problem with the public sector is there’s no values: no values imparted; no values displayed,” as if those who support the system either as teachers or other workers, or as parents, are in some way

Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .