Page 3789 - Week 12 - Wednesday, 22 November 2006
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
are going to be displaced from other preschools around when they close the preschools.
These spaces are not sitting empty for days at a time. These spaces are being used every day. The preschools in my area are being used two sessions a day most days a week because they run playgroups and playschools in the facilities as well. The preschools are being used because some of the area has already been sublet for childcare, and all of those places and those opportunities will be displaced by the proposals to close down these preschools, because the only possible way that this minister can make anything out of this is to sell the land, and we know that that is all part of the arrangement.
Ms Gallagher, of course, got up here in her usual indignant way and said, “I have been verballed. Mr Seselja came in here and verballed me again. How dare he!” Mr Speaker, I have been the shadow minister for education for over two years on and off. If you go through the Labor Party policy, which I do from time to time just to see where we are—
Mr Gentleman: We would like to go through yours, but we can’t find one.
Mr Barr: Seeking inspiration, Mrs Dunne; seeking to reach a higher standard.
MRS DUNNE: There are some useful things in it, some nice platitudes, and it is quite well set out. I like the layout—lots of white space. I seek leave to table this paper, Mr Speaker.
Leave granted.
MRS DUNNE: I table the following paper:
Education—Stanhope Labor policy paper—ACT election 2004, dated 24 September 2004.
I challenge anyone in this chamber or elsewhere to look through this document and find anywhere where Ms Gallagher as the previous minister, or the previous Stanhope government, even dropped a hint—the slightest hint—that they would consider closing schools; where there was even the slightest hint that as a community we might have to have a discussion about school closures. Quite the contrary, Mr Speaker; the only reference to closing schools in that policy that I have just tabled is where they say, “We have not closed preschools in the way that the Liberal Party did.” That is the only reference to school closures in that entire document. Nowhere at any time, except today, has this minister ever said in this place, “We did not go to the last election with a lie out in the public.”
There was a lie out in the public. The minister’s senior official said, “There are no plans to close schools in the life of the next Stanhope government.” The other thing that at the last ACT election we heard Mr Stanhope say was that people “need not be afraid of a majority Stanhope government”. Well, Mr Speaker, after 40 schools, including 22 preschools, I think the people of Canberra are starting to become very afraid.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .