Page 2916 - Week 09 - Wednesday, 20 September 2006
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itself is just a stay of execution and we do not want just a stay of execution on this truly draconian policy.
No responsible organisation would take radical decisions like this without basic information about what services they are supposed to be providing and to whom, but the Stanhope government has done that in this policy. What we propose to do today is put the brakes on.
The Liberal Party’s preferred position would be to throw it out and start again, but we do not have the legislative capacity to do that in this place. The best we can do at this stage is to put the brakes on. We want to put the brakes on. When we come back to make the final decision, we want the people of Canberra to have some teeth and some real input into the making of this decision. That is why we must support this bill today.
MR STANHOPE (Ginninderra—Chief Minister, Treasurer, Minister for Business and Economic Development, Minister for Indigenous Affairs and Minister for the Arts) (10.54): As the minister has indicated, the government will not be supporting this bill. Despite the protestations from the other side, the bill is nothing but a stunt, an ill-conceived attempt to delay the necessary action which the government proposes and seeks to take through the Towards 2020 proposal.
I think, in order to illustrate the extent to which this is a stunt, it is moot to refer to the position of the Liberal Party in government. It is relevant to refer to the position and the opinion of the Leader of the Opposition in support of his then minister for education, Mr Humphries, when the Liberal Party proposed to close 27 schools when in government. It is relevant, particularly in reply or response to everything Mrs Dunne has just said in relation to our proposal and our policy, to reflect on the policy of the Liberal Party in government and the honest opinions of Mr Bill Stefaniak, the Leader of the Opposition, in defence of the Liberal Party’s school closure policies. I will quote from the Hansard verbatim. These are the words of Mr Stefaniak on school closures:
I also want to talk about a few points about our school systems and about the school closures … the neighbourhood system has changed a fair bit in recent times in that, on the figures we have, it seems that in some cases up to … about 30 per cent of enrolments at certain schools are from out of area.
It is now 60 per cent. It continues:
That tends to put another slant on the argument often used by the Opposition of the distances some kids are going to have to travel to go to school. Our system is very good.
That is what Mr Stefaniak says. It continues, “Mr Humphries realises that.” He says that the Liberal government realises that. It continues:
… and Mr Humphries has continually stated that this excellent system will be maintained. I think we have always had a good system here. It might have been better in the past than it is now, because I note that about a third of our kids are in private schools and a lot of those schools have waiting lists.
Mr Seselja: You guys lied and lied at the last election.
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