Page 2230 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 16 August 2006
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consequences upon his own head. Rather, it involves arriving at good choices in a responsible manner. Probably the single most important element of this is basing one’s choices on proper information and due consideration. Responsible government involves not only the right outcomes but also the right process. In fact, the two are inseparable.
With this bill the opposition is attempting to bring procedural fairness to the current furore over school closures and amalgamations in the fervent hope of a fairer outcome. This bill will introduce several new features to the regime for consultation and decision making about our ACT schools and it should mean that we will never again have to witness in this place a repetition of the disgraceful approach taken by the government over the past two months. The Chief Minister’s and Minister Barr’s recent displays are the immediate driving force for this bill but I am also spurred on by the prospect that, at the end of the day, the people of the ACT, the people who own these schools, will be left with better arrangements than those currently in sway.
The most basic element of this bill is to put a freeze on school closure decisions until the end of March next year. This is necessary so that the multitudes of people now aggrieved by this government can pursue fairness, ultimately perhaps through the more sophisticated procedural provisions of this bill, which I will touch on shortly. But a moratorium by itself is nothing more than a stay of execution, so the opposition has gone further and makes provisions in this bill for good process when it comes to school closures. These provisions are not a stunt but a product of a great deal of careful consideration that started when the government first broke its word and took its ham-fist to Ginninderra District high school and closed it. The most important aim of these new provisions is to give those affected by school closures and amalgamations the information and means of involvement to which they, as ACT citizens, are entitled. This is true both for consultation and for ministerial decisions about school closures and amalgamations.
After enormous pressure Mr Barr has come up with some figures about the average cost per school for educating students. When these figures were eventually put forward they were, by the minister’s own admission, incorrect, but he refuses to correct those errors. The real point is that those figures are only one factor that the government has relied upon. The minister has said that the ACT government has considered a wide range of important aspects in developing this proposal. He says this on page 19 of his documentation. But for the most part, the members of the community, the people out there who own these schools, are still scratching their heads about what those important considerations are.
Clearly, for Mr Barr to publish only the cost figures is inadequate in the circumstances. The citizens are entitled to more. They are entitled to full disclosure of all relevant considerations while consultation takes place before a ministerial decision. They are entitled to full statements of reasons when decisions to close or amalgamate schools are eventually made. They are also entitled to genuine and well-ordered participation in consultation and to procedural fairness once the minister has made his decision. Justice demands that much for the people of the ACT, but at present there is nothing in law to guarantee this justice.
This bill will change that, because clear guidelines for consultation will be enunciated in a schedule to the Education Act. These guidelines have been a matter of considerable
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