Page 1214 - Week 04 - Thursday, 21 March 2013
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sure that we can arrive at a clear and consistent policy on the minor issues, such as the needed clarification of the address of non-government schools being identified by street rather than block and section.
Tania Parkes, in her report, recommends that there be accompanying explanatory notes with the regulation, to ensure that people are clear about what is and what is not included in the exemptions. As I said earlier, these issues of increased enrolment and definitions of existing schools versus new schools are the only real ones for potential concern, and represent an interesting intersection of good social policy and good planning processes. My office appreciated the opportunity to discuss these issues at some length and we were pleased that we were able to find common ground on these questions.
So today the Greens will be supporting this motion, and trust that in good faith the regulations will reflect the discussions we have had and as outlined today. I look forward to further discussions with ESDD on the specifics of the regulations.
MR CORBELL (Molonglo—Attorney-General, Minister for Police and Emergency Services, Minister for Workplace Safety and Industrial Relations and Minister for the Environment and Sustainable Development) (11.02), in reply: I thank Mr Rattenbury for his support of this motion. I am disappointed that the Liberal opposition is not joining with the government and the Greens today in relation to this matter, because we know that these exemption provisions have been strongly supported by school communities.
Schools do not operate in isolation from their communities. They engage with their neighbours; they engage with the residents in the suburbs that they are part of. We all know how integral local schools are to their local suburbs and their local communities, and how hard they work at engaging with those communities and reflecting and understanding their concerns. From the comments we have heard from Mr Seselja, you would think that schools act as rogue agents that ignore the views of the people and the families that they are there to serve. It is simply not the case in practice.
What is also very disappointing about the position of the opposition today is that this is an exemption that has been warmly supported not just by public schools, but by private schools—non-government schools, Catholic schools, other religious schools, who have all been beneficiaries of an exemption that has allowed for the timely development of new and improved infrastructure on their grounds. They have overwhelmingly supported such a provision. It has allowed them not just to take advantage of the BER funding, but to take advantage of other funding, be it the funds they raise themselves or funds from other sources, that has enabled them to upgrade school grounds and put in place new equipment, new shade structures, better buildings, better renovations, and upgrades to classrooms and other facilities—all of which are of benefit to those school communities.
What the Liberals are saying today is that they do not care about the timely dispatch of that type of infrastructure and investment; they want to remove the current advantage that those schools have and potentially put them through a process which is unwarranted. It is very disappointing that the opposition, when it comes to the test as
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