Page 4712 - Week 11 - Wednesday, 19 October 2011
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
This year this minister tells teachers to, in effect, suck it up over teacher attendance records. He again promises the six-figure salaries to the media while stalling and dragging out the negotiations. Mr Barr, teachers have stopped listening. They do not believe this minister any more. And why should they? They know he is full of media spin and hot air. They know he is short on commitment when it comes to education. He simply does not care. And, Mr Barr, it is beginning to show.
Prevarication and obfuscation have been the hallmark of this minister. As a result, today we still have no resolution on teacher salaries, the AEU has still not been able to finalise a new pay structure for its members and teachers are still not confident that they have a future in teaching in ACT schools. Parents are equally nervous; we have, for the first time anywhere in Australia, more families enrolling their year 7 students in non-government high schools than government high schools. Is it any wonder the families have lost confidence in this minister and this government when it comes to sound educational outcomes?
When it comes to policy backflips and backdowns, Mr Barr has no equal. As I indicated earlier, I will name just a few of these backflips. There were smaller class sizes; that was to be his great driver of success and reform. Having originally knocked the Liberals for suggesting it, then stealing the policy, he stalled at grade 3, from memory, on this program.
There was the Shaddock review. The initial announcement excluded non-government schools from the Shaddock review of special needs education. After two months of constant pressure from us, he finally included them. There was the Shepherd Centre. He announced that he would be cutting funding for the centre; only after a concentrated campaign from us and the many distraught parents was the decision reversed by this minister.
This minister abandoned Noah’s Ark initially and then begrudgingly, after months of agitation from again the same people I referred to before, offered funding to the end of this year. The education efficiency dividend consultation process with teachers was announced in the middle of the school holidays; only after pressure from the Canberra Liberals was the consultation period extended and opened to include parents as well.
After promoting school principal autonomy, he walked away from that notion by not supporting the first opportunity to do it through the Lanyon high school principal’s innovative solution to the truancy problem. Where do you stand today on this policy, Mr Barr? For or against it? It is hard to keep up with you on all these many Barr flips.
There are the already mentioned efficiency dividend cuts to hearing and visually impaired children. That will probably go down as Minister Barr’s darkest hour and biggest backflip to date. He refused to meet with Weston Creek preschool parents when he was confronted by angry parents at the Woden open cabinet meeting. On why he had not responded to them, he replied with: “I get 1,000 emails a week on these issues from the parents.” I am quoting you on this, Mr Barr. If you do get that many—1,000 emails a week—what does that suggest? Does it suggest that you have got a big problem in education and you need to start listening and taking
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video