Page 3554 - Week 11 - Wednesday, 15 November 2006
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or one of the other denominational schools, but it concerns me when you have well over a third of the primary school students at private schools and you have this drift away from the public sector and you just ignore those signs and try to dismiss them as demographic factors.
I would have vastly more confidence in the whole basis of this education policy that is being presented by the new minister if I thought it was based on strong, persuasive research whereby we had identified the reasons that people are taking their kids out of schools. It may not be any one single factor, but it could well be a host of factors, and we would need to rank those. But in this whole debate I have not seen one example of anything tangible being presented that suggests to me a depth of knowledge on what are the factors.
I went to three of the school meetings. I found each one more or less a rerun. I heard nothing at any of them that I had not heard previously. I know that Mrs Dunne was far more diligent. Frankly, I never heard the minister address the issue which I raised at the budget breakfast and which is essential to why he is facing these problems in public education.
No-one will convince me that the way to build growth is to keep closing down options of accessibility and availability. There may be old schools and there might be demographic arguments that you cannot make some of them viable. That is something that could be argued in this place. But we are yet to see evidence that the government has actually identified the core problem, and I do not understand that.
We have had a lot of debate about consultation. I am probably in a minority of one in this place in that, whilst I understand the statutory obligations on consultation, I am not sure, in my book, that that is the main issue. We have had this long process. People have their own views and you can talk to lots of people, but that does not necessarily mean that you get to the heart of the problem. But if we had reliable, accurate research undertaken by credible parties, peer-review examined and presented to this place, I think that we could all look with a greater level of confidence and certainty going forward to the basis on which the budget of the ACT government as it relates to education and this whole 2020 program is being formulated.
I have not been a major player in the debate here. This has been Mrs Dunne’s area and that of others, but I have heard nothing through all those debates that has given me any level of confidence that we have really got our finger on the pulse in terms of what is causing the loss of confidence in the public school system. I have had my own experiences. I have cited examples here which could be dismissed as just one person’s observation. I have said what I think about shared classes. I was attacked by Ms Gallagher in my maiden speech. I understand that I am in the history books, along with Chamberlain, as the only person who has ever been attacked in giving their first speech in the parliament.
Mrs Dunne: Disraeli.
MR MULCAHY: Disraeli, was it? There you go. I have not even got my history accurate on that issue, Mrs Dunne. I made that concern known then and I remain concerned about the fact that shoving groups of classes together, putting up partitions
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