Page 4380 - Week 12 - Tuesday, 13 October 2009

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Amendment 3 states that if a student is suspended for 20 consecutive school days, the student must attend not less than three counselling sessions. The addition of three days of counselling to the bill goes to the heart of the lack of support currently in place for students at risk of disengaging. We were quite happy to negotiate on the wording of this with the government. We were happy to change this to reflect access, for at least three days, to appropriate programs instead of counselling per se. Mr Barr’s arrogant, unbending attitude will result in Mr Barr voting against giving ACT principals the same powers of suspension as in New South Wales and voting against giving suspended students counselling. Mr Barr continually takes an “all or nothing” approach to negotiation. Today, if he ends up with nothing, he has no-one but himself to blame.

When the bill was introduced, we supported it in principle. We suggested that ACT principals should have the same powers of suspension as principals in all other states and territories. We suggested that the department and school should work with the student through counselling to address the underlying issues and prevent repetition. Mr Barr rejected the proposals outright. If Mr Barr votes against the suspension powers amendment then it is quite clear that Minister Barr does not trust our principals to have the same powers as those given in other states and territories. We do trust them.

If Mr Barr votes against the suspension powers amendment then he also votes against the counselling. He does not believe in counselling for at-risk students during their suspension. We do believe in it. Mr Barr believes he knows better than every other state and territory government. He wants it his way, and his way only.

The opposition welcomes the initiative of giving principals more autonomy when it comes to decision making surrounding behaviour management. However, we also believe it simply does not go far enough. We believe that we should increase the current limit of five days suspension to 20 days, which is a maximum which will at least bring us in line with other jurisdictions nationwide.

In this way, the Education Amendment Bill will take away some of the red tape and frustration of the principals associated with referring matters to the CEO of ACT education, and provide much-needed autonomy for the principals. However, we feel it is also imperative that there is significant concentration on the strengthening of the support measures required to be in place to assist those students who may need to be suspended for an extended period of time. I commend these amendments to the Assembly in the interests of our schools, our school leaders and our students.

MR BARR (Molonglo—Minister for Education and Training, Minister for Children and Young People, Minister for Planning and Minister for Tourism, Sport and Recreation) (4.41): Again, the government will not be supporting these amendments. I outlined prior to lunch the number of significant flaws in this hastily cobbled together piece of rubbish that is Mr Doszpot’s amendments. Why he would seek to limit in the law the response to a suspension just to counselling sessions and then seek to mandate a minimum amount is crazy public policy. It really is unworthy of even being brought into this place as it is so poorly conceived and so hastily cobbled together.


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