Page 4181 - Week 13 - Thursday, 14 December 2006
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Minister for Education and Training
Motion of censure
MRS DUNNE (Ginninderra) (3.10): I seek leave to move a motion to censure the Minister for Education and Training for his handling of the Towards 2020 policy.
Leave granted.
MRS DUNNE: I move:
That this Assembly censures the Minister for Education and Training for his handling of the Towards 2020 policy, specifically:
(1) he presided over the wholesale breaking of its commitments to the Canberra electorate when it promised no schools would close in the life of this Assembly;
(2) his failure to adequately explain the purpose and justification of the policy;
(3) his failure to provide the community with the necessary information on which the policy was based;
(4) his failure to provide adequate reasons for the decision announced on 13 December 2006;
(5) his decision to introduce substantial new initiatives into the policy at the time of its final announcement;
(6) the poor handling of the announcement on 13 December 2006; and
(7) the poor treatment of groups, individuals and community adversely affected by the decision.
Mr Speaker, we have come to this state today after just over six months of poor handling of the education portfolio by this new tyro minister for education. He has failed as a minister to properly handle his portfolio, and his specific handling of the so-called school renewal process Towards 2020 is the single standout issue in his failure as a minister.
From the outset the handling of this process has been appalling. The way this was introduced, the way this was announced to the people of Canberra on 6 June this year, the way in which the material became available to people across the community and the quality of the material that became available to the people across the community shows an amateurish approach by a minister who is charged with carrying out his duties with the highest degree of professionalism.
The quality of the information, the way that it has been put together and the capacity that this minister and his department have shown in imparting this information to the people of the ACT reveal that the minister is an abject failure. This man has failed. From the outset his handling of the process has been appalling and to this day, even
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