Page 3608 - Week 08 - Friday, 24 August 2012
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evidenced by the fact that Brendan Smyth will not stand in this place and say he supports the Salvation Army in their endeavours to support youth homelessness.
In closing, I would like to thank our partners across the social community housing sector for the fabulous work they do, from very small organisations to much larger organisations, in their work for people with a disability. The people that head-lease some of our properties for some of our most challenging communities do a wonderful job and make sure that people are supported and housed safely so that they can get an opportunity in their lives.
The housing staff, from the executive director right down to the support staff and the housing managers, do a fabulous job. We are the largest landlord in the ACT. They do a very good job in supporting not only the tenants but the fabric of our housing accommodation here in the ACT.
Proposed expenditure agreed to.
Proposed expenditure—Part 1.16—Education and Training Directorate—$558,459,000 (net cost of outputs), $122,318,000 (capital injection) and $228,229,000 (payments on behalf of the territory), totalling $909,006,000.
MR DOSZPOT (Brindabella) (2.59): The Education and Training Directorate is responsible for the operation of 84 public schools, with over 40,000 students—39,600 in mainstream schools and 403 in four special schools. With a budget of close to $600 million, it is our second largest expenditure and is one of the most important investments a government can make.
The minister made much in his post-budget publicity of the importance of and advances in ACT education. He talked enthusiastically about new schools coming on stream and the ongoing support for students with a disability, and highlighted a number of other minor initiatives. What he failed to mention was the requirement that his directorate find $27 million in savings in the next four years because of Labor’s financial mismanagement going back over the last 11 years.
There were no comforting words during the estimate committee process as to how the directorate will meet this figure. In fact, the answers given were vague and evasive and perhaps very worrying. “The directorate, in consultation with staff, unions and the community, is going to identify savings,” said this minister. Given this is the government that is not strong on community consultation, a directorate that has already closed 23 schools without community consultation, that last time it sought an efficiency dividend it was through cuts to support for the visually and hearing impaired, to ESL support positions and it is the same directorate that took years and a teachers strike to deliver an agreed salaries outcome for teachers, I believe teachers, school communities and parents will need to be very much on the alert if this government is given an opportunity to, indeed, find these savings. Remember it has been done before, and this Labor government, if given half a chance, would do it again.
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