Page 921 - Week 03 - Thursday, 21 March 2019
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Your petitioners, therefore, request the Assembly to call upon the government to:
1. reinstate the number 3 bus route; or
2. divert either the number 53 or another route to travel through the ANU campus via Daley Road, thus servicing the western portion of the ANU; or
3. work with the ANU to provide funding for a regular and reliable shuttle bus running within the ANU to the City Bus Station.
Pursuant to standing order 99A, these petitions, having more than 500 signatories, were referred to the Standing Committee on Education, Employment and Youth Affairs and the Standing Committee on Environment and Transport and City Services respectively.
The Clerk having announced that the terms of the petitions would be recorded in Hansard and referred to the appropriate ministers for response pursuant to standing order 100, the petitions were received.
Motion to take note of petitions
MADAM SPEAKER: Pursuant to standing order 98A, I move:
That the petitions so lodged be noted.
MS LEE (Kurrajong) (10.11): Four weeks ago this Assembly debated my motion on the need for an independent inquiry into ACT schools to address the reasons for unfettered violence in many of our schools and the failure of the system to deal with them. I thank my colleagues, especially Mr Wall who moved the motion in my absence while I was in hospital. During the debate, Mr Wall said:
There is something endemically wrong in the current structure, approach and attitude of the minister and the directorate in dealing with this issue of antisocial behaviour.
And that an independent inquiry will:
… provide a fresh window on the problem, an unbiased study into the various factors at work. Such an inquiry will hopefully go some way to restoring faith in these ACT schools of a growing disillusioned parent community.
About two weeks ago the minister was quoted in the media as saying that she would have an investigation, then it was a review, and on Tuesday of this week it had morphed into the safe and supportive schools advisory committee. Already it is beginning to feel like a cover-up, notwithstanding the eminently qualified and impressive membership of that committee.
The committee is already severely restricted, with at least one hand, if not both hands, tied behind their backs, because we know they will not take evidence and they will not investigate particular schools or incidents. When pressed, the minister said that parents and teachers will not be excluded from contributing to the committee, but she has failed to explain what that contribution may look like. Instead, the committee will
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