Page 2552 - Week 08 - Tuesday, 9 August 2016
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
The schools for all funding also includes additional funding for improving, upgrading and building safe sensory spaces at schools—$1.7 million over four years to roll out the positive behaviour support program across all schools, and $760,000 over four years for training and scholarships to build professional expertise in managing students with complex needs and challenging behaviours. That is why I think this funding is a strong start to meeting some of the challenges that lie before us in this area.
I note the comment Mr Doszpot made about the non-government schools being overlooked. This is a myth that is important to address in tonight’s discussion while we reflect on this year’s budget. Under this year’s national education reform agreement, non-government schools in the ACT have received a six per cent increase in funding, or $15 million. Within that, the Catholic education system has received $11 million in additional funding, or a 7.7 per cent increase in their funding.
The question that remains then is: given that significant additional funding those schools are receiving, will they allocate some of that to addressing the schools for all recommendations? I can assure the Assembly that the government is working very closely with the non-government sectors to implement schools for all. We know we cannot just deliver this in government schools; we have to deliver it right across the schooling sector in the ACT, and we are doing that. There is a series of points of collaboration—and I reported on that to the Assembly last week—where the three schooling systems are working on a number of things together.
The program board is comprised of the Catholic education system, the public school system through the directorate and the Association of Independent Schools. A series of resources is being shared and intellectual work and knowledge is being shared. That is in all directions; the directorate does not have exclusively the best knowledge on this. Great progress is being made in the non-government sector as well. I am really pleased with that collaboration.
What was announced in the budget was the government’s response in the government school system. That is what the government is supposed to do, and the budget is about where the government is spending its money. As I have outlined, the non-government schools received a considerable boost in funding this year under the national education reform agreement. I guess the question Mr Doszpot and parents need to ask if they have concerns about this is: how much of that additional funding are those schools allocating to their schools for all implementation? That is what the government system has done: it has used its additional funding through that process to prioritise some of this work.
This goes to the additional funding that Mr Hanson has just talked about. It is not clear to me—and this is a question Mr Hanson and Mr Doszpot and the Liberal Party will need to answer during the election campaign—whether the additional money they are proposing to allocate to the non-government system is funded through the increases in the national education reform agreement, or NERA, funding? Are they pre-allocating that, or is it additional money on top of it? If they are pre-allocating it,
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video