Education Amendment (Non-Government Schools Registration) Bill 2004
Reverend the Hon. Dr GORDON MOYES: The object of this bill is to amend the Education Act 1990 to provide more rigorous standards for registration of non-government schools by enhancing the criteria for the registration of non-government schools and by making sure that teachers are fully equipped to teach. The bill also amends the Education Act to provide for courses of study in key learning areas in both government and non-government schools, based on and taught in accordance with syllabuses developed or endorsed by the Board of Studies. The Christian Democratic party supports the bill. We recognise the research by Commissioner Warren Grimshaw and look forward to seeing his report when it is eventually released.
I am an active member of the Australian College of Education and I am very keen on some of the issues that have been raised today. The bill aims to increase accountability and transparency in the non-government school sector, of which I have been part. I was involved in the establishment of a large institute at a tertiary level which today has some 4,500 students and which is accredited to grant degrees at bachelor and master levels in more than a dozen different subjects.
In the face of the flurry of publicity, particularly by some of the public school teacher unions, I note that the State Government spends 92.5 per cent of its $6.9 billion education budget on State schools. Only 7.5 per cent goes to private schools, although the pupil ratio is approximately 32 per cent to 68 per cent respectively. When Federal Government support to private schools is factored in, private schools, with 32 per cent of pupils, get 20 per cent of funding. However, having said that, I am committed to all schools having quality teaching, teaching set curricula, and having safe buildings.
The issue of non-government schools with teachers with excellent qualification and no teaching diploma is very real. Only today I discovered that a member of my staff has almost completed his third PhD but he has no teaching diploma and therefore must undertake some graduate diploma in education before he can teach. I have been responsible for employing specialist teachers—in such creative arts subjects as dance, drama, music, counselling, psychology and theology—and all of them had PhDs. I remember searching Australia to find a teacher with a PhD in teaching drama. Eventually I found a person with those qualifications in Evanston in the United States and brought him back to Australia. But very few people with such qualifications have graduate diplomas in education.
To this end, two years ago at Wesley Institute we initiated proceedings to establish courses for a graduate diploma of education so that every one of our private school instructors not only has excellence in the particular curricula for which they are specialist teachers but also have graduate diplomas in the art of teaching. I would encourage the Government to pursue this course. There is no excuse for teachers at any level—primary, secondary or tertiary—who have excellence in particular subjects but do not have elementary diplomas in education. We also support transparency in enrolments. But I make the point that in enrolment transparency there should be special areas that incorporate the numbers of disabled children and the numbers of non-English-speaking background children that are allowed in schools.
There should also be transparency in discipline. I support the banning of corporal punishment, although many members and supporters of the Christian Democratic Party do not. I have urged that all schools outlaw physical punishment. I remember writing a paper on this issue in the 1970s or perhaps in early 1980. I found only recently, 25 years later, that that paper is still being quoted on the Internet in, of all things, Portuguese emanating out of Brazil. In Australia we need standards on the abolition of corporal punishment.
The transparency of reporting should also include examples of schools providing for student welfare, and all sources of school funding. By that I mean not only Commonwealth and State government sources but also private sources, fundraising and the like. I agree entirely with the Government’s remarks about annual reports being produced. It has been part and practice of my public life for the past 47 years to produce annual reports on the areas in which I have been involved. But what concerns me is where the annual reports from public schools are disseminated. Where are they distributed? To whom do they go? Who sees them? My home is surrounded by three good public schools, but in the past 25 years living in that area I have never seen reference in the local press, in my letterbox, or anywhere else to any annual report from any public school.
I believe that we need to have an objective report on the standard of school buildings. Without going down the track of a former speaker against whom an objection was raised in the Chamber concerning the standard of school buildings, I say that there is no question that we do need objective reports on the standard of buildings so that they are safe, not only for students but for the occupational health and safety of teachers. The Federal Government is spending $1 billion on capital works in schools during its current term in office. We need transparency, particularly about the state of New South Wales public schools. The Christian Democratic Party [CDP] supports the Government’s amendment and I thank the Government for adopting the CDP amendment. As the Clerk will confirm, we proposed this amendment before the Government introduced it. I do not care who gets the credit in this case.
Reverend the Hon. Dr GORDON MOYES: We are all dependent upon outside resources and interested parties in this matter. The CDP commends the amendment concerning proceedings for breach of contract against proprietors of non-government schools. I recognise the very nice—I use the word in its correct sense—legal aspects of this amendment and the CDP supports it. I commend the Government for the thrust of this bill.