Page 1175 - Week 05 - Tuesday, 24 April 1990
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Preschool Closures
MR MOORE: My question is directed to Mr Humphries as Minister for Health, Education and the Arts. On 1 November 1989, in the discussion of a matter of public importance that he raised about preschools, Dr Hector Kinloch stated:
... if we had the kind of government in the ACT which wished to go back on almost a hundred years of preschool and kindergarten education, then one could understand this need to close preschools.
I refer to Hansard, volume 11, page 2325. Will the Minister therefore keep all preschools open or is it - in the words of his now Executive Deputy in charge of putting his foot in his mouth - the kind of Government intent - - -
Mr Humphries: I answered that.
MR SPEAKER: Order! Please withdraw that, Mr Moore.
MR MOORE: I withdraw that, Mr Speaker.
Dr Kinloch: Thank you, Michael.
MR MOORE: We are very sensitive, though, aren't we, Mr Speaker?
MR SPEAKER: We are trying to lift the proceedings.
MR MOORE: In the words of the Minister's now Executive Deputy, is yours "the kind of government intent upon putting ACT education back almost a hundred years"?
MR HUMPHRIES: Mr Speaker, it is interesting that Mr Moore has adopted the values and mores of the Australian Labor Party. It assumes that the expression of dissenting and different points of view within a particular group or alliance of parties represents some kind of falling apart or disagreement between those parties of a fundamental nature. I welcome and value Dr Kinloch's contribution to this debate. He is a consistently strong voice for education and educational values and I value that very much. I have to put that on the record right here and now.
In terms of whether we will be able to retain every single preschool that is presently in our system, I simply cannot say. I have made it very clear that the Government will ensure that every part of the education system is properly assessed in the process of considering whether school consolidations ought to occur, and the preschool system is not exempt from that process. I want that to be very clear at this stage. In terms of what will happen, I think Mr Moore, like Mr Berry, will have to wait and see.
MR MOORE: I have a supplementary question, Mr Speaker. Is it a hundred years or more retrograde step to argue that a number of places - whether 13,000 or 9,000 - are vacant as
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