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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 7 Hansard (24 June) . . Page.. 2411 ..
MR SMYTH
(continuing):Mr Pratt, I think, detailed very clearly the majority of our concerns with the education budget and the direction of education under this government. I just wanted to concentrate on the dilemma that we face as a city where parents are choosing to remove their children in large numbers and in growing numbers from our high school system. There clearly is a problem there. Something like 44 per cent of high school students from, say, years 7 to 10 are now not in the government system. The apparent indifference by the minister during questioning in estimates, I think, is a matter of very, very serious concern.
The previous government realised that we needed to work on our high schools. We set up the high schools for the new millennium project to give them the impetus, the kick on, to raise the standard, to make the high schools more attractive. That project did some work, but I think that work needs to be continued.
It's curious that the government doesn't seem interested in supporting the non-government sector as much as other governments have. When we queried the minister as to what would happen, she said, "Well, thank goodness, for the non-government sector; they can pick these kids up."
Ms Gallagher
: I don't think I said that.MR SMYTH
: Obviously there is this need for the sector when the government can't supply it. But when the government doesn't want it, that sector doesn't get the funding; they whip the ISS scheme out late on a Thursday night. I think that's a shame.If the minister thinks I've paraphrased her incorrectly, she can grab the Hansard, but I think the Hansard will prove that that's basically what you said. If you want me to withdraw it, you prove it and I'm happy to come back here and say I got it wrong and we'll discuss your words exactly. If you want, I can grab a Hansard as well.
I think the point here was that there is nothing in the directions that the minister is taking or the government's taking to address the obvious bleed from the government sector into the non-government sector in high schools. I think that should be of concern for all of us.
Conversely, when you get to the college years of 11 and 12, there is a movement back. What is it that makes years 7 to 12 attractive to parents to move their children out of the system, and what is that makes it attractive to move them back in years 11 and 12? We need to capitalise on the good things that the government sector does in the primary sector where I think it's about 33 per cent of kids go to the non-government sector. Then you've got this dramatic move out in the high school years and then you've got a move back in the college years. There is a dilemma there.
What we're not seeing from this government is any leadership on the issue; what we're not seeing is any apparent concern at the bleed; and what we're not seeing is any initiative, certainly in this budget, to address that issue. I think we should be addressing it and I think it's a shame that, with an opportunity in a budget like this, there isn't something to bolster the efforts that we make in the high school years
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