Page 3118 - Week 08 - Thursday, 25 June 2009
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government allocates to non-government schools. We simply take receipt of it and on-pass it to non-government schools.
So, whilst he might want to confect a great political scandal, I suggest that there is a little bit of history, a little bit of understanding of the issues—and I acknowledge that funding arrangements for schools in Australia are very complex. It would be worth noting that the ACT is, as far as I understand it, the only jurisdiction that pays more money at a state or territory level to non-government schools than it receives from the commonwealth for government schools. Everywhere else in the country, the reverse situation is the case. For the ACT, out of ACT budget funding, the $46.5 million that was provided in 2009-10 is more than the recurrent operating grant that is provided by the commonwealth government to the ACT for government schools.
The ACT government are and will always be the major provider of funding for the public school system—about 91 per cent of funding. It is our responsibility, it is our system, and of course we will prioritise it. To suggest otherwise is, in my view, very poor public policy. That is not to suggest that there is not a role for the territory government in providing funding for non-government schools, and we have increased that amount in successive budgets. But we have sought to target it around areas of identified need, in consultation with the non-government school sector.
There are other elements of this budget, most particularly in relation to support for gifted and talented students and support for school-based apprenticeships, that go to the heart of the diversity of our public education system, to meet the needs of a diverse range of students. It will always be the role of the public system to be a universal system that aims to meet the needs of all the students in the territory, and my view is and will always remain that the public system has an obligation to provide quality education to all comers.
It is the core business of the territory government—that is why I am in politics—to deliver quality education outcomes. And from time to time that means making difficult decisions in the face of opposition for opposition’s sake—I have seen that through my entire career in this place. Criticism by you lot earlier today for my allegedly not taking difficult decisions in this budget, and using as examples of that your opposition to the difficult decisions I have taken in previous budgets, is the height of farce and hypocrisy—and you will stand condemned for your lack of intestinal fortitude on difficult decisions, particularly in relation to reforming education to get high-quality outcomes. That is what drives political engagement. It is why you are still here at quarter past 12 on a Friday morning, debating education policy; it is because you might care about driving reform and delivering higher-quality education outcomes. And that is why I am in this game—not to be debating you guys at 20 past 12 on a Friday morning.
In moving on, it is worth noting the comments of other stakeholders in relation to this education budget. I think Elizabeth Singer from the P&C association summed it up best when she said:
In tough financial times, it is encouraging that public education spending has risen 4.4%.
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