Mr BAYLEY - Thank you, Chair. I start by acknowledging victims/survivors, whistleblowers and advocates, both in the room and watching online. I acknowledge their bravery.
I also acknowledge our teaching cohort in public schools. The overwhelming majority of teachers go well above and beyond their job descriptions and have the absolute best interests of the students at heart.
The issues we discuss here today pertain to a very, very small minority of people who have been operating in that system. Nonetheless, we need to get to the bottom of the findings of the commission and indeed, the response of the Government.
To that, minister, I will go straight to budgetary issues. We know that public schools are significantly underfunded. They are funded to 91 per cent of the minimum benchmark for the schooling resources within the standard. I want to understand the funding strategy when it comes to the Government's response to the commission of inquiry and indeed, the independent inquiry. For example, the Government's interim response website highlights that some actions, such as recommendation 7 from the McCormack Smallbone inquiry have been implemented. I think you just acknowledged that.
For example, there's a little blue dot 'appoint a safeguarding officer in every school' and the website goes on to say:
The safeguarding in schools' models approved by the minister for decyp in October 2022 and is funded in the forward estimates. Safeguarding leads commenced their roles in all state government schools at the beginning of Term 1 2023.
The 2022-23 Budget Papers highlight that some of these recommendations are not funded with new budget allocations but they are diverted from existing departmental resources. And we are not talking about small amounts here. For example, the 2022-23 Budget Papers highlight that in responding to recommendations 7, 9 and 10, it is going to cost $6.2 million in 2022-23; $8.5 million the following year; $9.6 million the following year, and in 2025-26, $12 million. The note, and I will read directly from the Budget Papers, says:
This is a new initiative funded from within the Department's existing resources.
I am interested to know, in a budget-constrained environment, what are the services that are being delivered to children that are being cut in order to deliver these new services through the safeguarding schools model? We are talking about a lot of money: $6 million up to $12 million in 2025. You cannot magic that up out of the department's budget and expect that everything else proceeds as per usual.
Mr JAENSCH - No services are being cut to pay for these measures.
Mr BAYLEY - How can you say that, minister?
Mr JAENSCH - We have been through this in Estimates. You need to look at the explanations that we gave Mr Willie and others through the Estimates process on this last time around. You are feigning ignorance of how school funding works.
When you talked about the SRS and the proportion of funding, under our current National School Reform Agreement, Tasmania is increasing its funding year by year to a maximum of 75 per cent of the SRS by 2027, the federal government has a commitment to 20 per cent of the SRS, so there's a gap of 5 per cent. We are currently entering into a year of negotiation for a new NSRA right now. Our position is that the federal government needs to come up with another 5 per cent so we reach 100 per cent Gonski.
Mr BAYLEY - There needs to be more funding, minister, absolutely; I don't disagree.
Mr JAENSCH - I thank you for your support for our campaign - Give Me 5 for Kids, I call it. Minister Clare needs to come up with another 5 per cent to support our government schools across Australia reaching 100 per cent full Gonski funding.
Mr BAYLEY - Minister, can I ask the question a different way?
CHAIR - Order.
Mr JAENSCH - The matter is that there are categories of expenses within schools that are to be funded through the jointly funded SRS. There is more money each year where there are new activities identified that are within the scope of the NSRA and the use of the SRS. The new growth funding will be allocated in part to those, which doesn't mean cutting anything. It means that there is more money each year. Each year, there needs to be decisions made within the scope of the SRS and the NSRA about how that money is used.
Where keeping kids safe is a priority and a legitimate use of those funds, that's where funds will be sourced from. It doesn't mean cutting anything else. You'll see that our Government is also investing new money in additional other activities, including increasing our rollout of phonics and explicit teaching of literacy in our primary schools right across the state. There are more programs, activities and priorities being funded, not less.
Mr BAYLEY - Minister, let me read it again. It says this is a new initiative in the responses to the commission of inquiry or to the department's independent inquiry. It says this is a new initiative funded from within the department's existing resources. I think your explanation there is quite cute. Yes, perhaps you can say that you're not cutting them, but the increases -
Mr JAENSCH - You said we were cutting them. So I have to say we're not.
Mr BAYLEY - Cutting them in real terms is what I'm talking about, because you're putting additional funding into schools presumably to increase the funding for existing programs and bolster support and so forth. This is a new initiative funding from within the department's existing resources, so something must give. Something is not getting the funding that it should have under normal circumstances because you are now funding these programs.
Mr JAENSCH - In that context, I understand that existing resources would be referring to the existing planned and locked-in funding growth under our growth funding model. I ask if the secretary wants to add any other detail.
Mr BULLARD - Under the Government's bilateral agreement with the Commonwealth, the Tasmanian Government committed to an additional $490 million over 10 years. So, year on year, the department has a fixed budget for Education that grows incrementally and every year we make decisions about how that money is going to be spent.
Mr BAYLEY - Presumably costs increase as well year by year?
Mr BULLARD - The cost increases are taken into account. This is additional funding in the system above and beyond what the year before it cost to run a school. Some of that goes into the wage growth, the indexation of schools for their supplies and materials, and other funding goes into initiatives. Safety is a core duty of schools. What we're doing is providing schools with additional support to ensure that children and young people in those institutions are safe, rather than rely on existing staff to do that work. One thing we know very clearly is that we want teachers in classrooms to be teaching. Where we can provide tier 2 support to schools to undertake other functions such as safeguarding, we see that as a sound investment.
Mr BAYLEY - In relation to those positions, can you provide the committee details on how many positions have been added by region to deliver the safeguarding in schools functions?
Mr JAENSCH - There is safeguarding lead in every government school - 195.
Mr BAYLEY - Is that correct? The existing teachers - that's what it reads. Are they new positions?
Mr JAENSCH - Schools were provided additional resources to cover this requirement. How they filled it was a matter for them. They needed to ensure that they had senior and experienced people who understand the school environment and were able to take up a leadership role. There is a range of different ways they can do that but they weren't left without resource as a result of that.
Mr BAYLEY - Can you provide the committee with how many new employees were engaged by the department to fulfil these responsibilities?
Mr BULLARD - I think that would be difficult. The initial model was to provide an allocation for a new employee. However, it's not an FTE per school. There is an allocation that responds to the size of schools requested and we responded that they were able to make school-based decisions. For some schools that would be adding additional hours to someone who is a part-time employee. For big entities, they did recruit an additional person, so it would be difficult to disaggregate that. What we could provide you with is the FTE equivalent of how many positions have been created, but they will be filled in different ways.
Mr JAENSCH - My notes say that the budgeting was based around 72 FTEs across the system equivalent.
Mr BAYLEY - An incredibly important line of questioning, thank you, Ms O'Byrne. I won't take it further, because it looks like we are not getting any further with the answers.
I want to look to the future and continue with the funding question and go back to the safeguarding leads. They have been in place now since day one of term 1 of this year; it is almost a full year. What feedback processes do you have in place to allow them to reflect on their experiences and the level of funding they have and the capacity they have to do the jobs that they were employed or appointed to do? How are you going to respond to that? Do you have contingencies to be able to increase funding and needs there?
Mr JAENSCH - Chair, I would like to take the opportunity to bring to the table, Liz Jack, who is Deputy Secretary for keeping children safe in DECYP, who has had the lead on the safeguarding activity from its early days, and who can provide you an update on the process for feedback and communication with our network of leads across the state.
Mr BAYLEY - Again the question is around funding and the ability to respond to any funding needs and requests that they have as a collective for expansion of a program, additional resources, et cetera. That is specifically what I would like to understand, before going to a follow-up around external providers.
Ms JACK - Thank you, minister. When we put in place the safeguarding leads in schools, we made it very clear that it was going to be a 'test and try', even in terms of the model of the scale of the FTE per school. We said that we would take a full year and then do an assessment. That assessment will take into account feedback from the safeguarding leads - and the principals of the schools because it has to work for the entire school community.
Mr BAYLEY - Have you got contingency and have you got capacity to increase their capacity or the resources available to those safeguarding leads? Or are you working within the only envelope that you have been given at the moment?
Ms JACK - No, at the beginning we said that we would review it and if there is a need we would certainly have to go through our normal budget process. This is a priority of the Government, as the minister said, and also of the department. If there was a need, we would certainly be looking at how we would change the model.
