Page 1582 - Week 06 - Thursday, 7 June 2007
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Mr Barr: Where did you get 32, Bill?
MR STEFANIAK: Sorry, 23. It has accelerated due to the closure of those schools, and it something you should be very concerned about. Whilst you have spent money in terms of some new schools—yes, that is welcome—that is hardly the only answer. There are a number of things I think you can do which do not necessarily entail spending any money at all.
While the ACT budget promises a new high school at Kambah and a new senior secondary college in Gungahlin, nothing can compensate for the summary closure of 23 schools at the end of last year with the same desultory consultation after the fact that has been a hallmark of your arrogant government. Many parents whose children lost their schools had salt rubbed in the wound on budget day this week when they learnt that, far from being in this dire economic crisis you presented us with last year, on any way you might account, the ACT now has a surplus.
The Save Our Schools group told the ABC that, on the basis of this year’s budget, it seemed that last year’s bulk closure of schools could have been avoided. Spokesman, Trevor Cobbold, a man I always found very reasonable to deal with when I was the minister, said the closures program increased the financial burden on families and resulted in emotional and physical upheaval for students, but was all for nothing. Mr Cobbold said that the dire budget position was held up by the government as the reason for school closures, yet surpluses were now being predicted for the next five years.
The Flynn primary school P&C association put out a release last night. Their release said Canberrans were enraged by the budget’s revelation that schools did not need to close. They said:
School closures have been totally devastating for families and communities, so now that it is clear that there was no financial imperative, people want to know—well what were the closures based upon?
It would seem, Mr Speaker, savings to date from the school closures have been minuscule. Budget paper 4 on page 389 indicates some $616,000, and the full effect from reduced wages from schools and school rationalisation appears to be $1.685 million. If that is correct, that is not much savings for such pain. Having closed a minuscule number of schools myself, compared with you, Mr Barr, I can tell you that you do not actually save a huge amount of money by closing bricks and mortar. It is probably a relatively inefficient way of funding savings. There are other things you can do.
The Catholic Education Commission, which the government forgets about, is part of our school system. It has also reacted negatively to your education budget. The commission said that it is “extremely disappointed that the ACT Labor government has again failed to deliver on most of its 2004 pre-election commitments to non-government schools”. The latest budget has allocated no new funding to non-government schools apart from grant supplementation at about half the level of last year’s ACT inflation rate. They said this means that per student funding from the
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