Mr BAYLEY (Clark) – Thank you, Deputy Speaker. I thank the Leader of the Opposition for bringing this motion forward today and giving us the opportunity to discuss a review and the significant challenges facing the education system. It has been quite the day for education, what with the member for Clark’s motion earlier around bullying in schools. It is very welcome to see this parliament put this level of attention into this issue, because education is so critical to the future of the state.
I will start by acknowledging our education professionals, our teachers, our support workers and others – and families, who are working so hard to put children through school under difficult circumstances, I might say.
There are significant challenges. Nobody can deny that there are significant challenges. I do not consider anyone can deny that more investment can be made in education, not only financial investment but other levels of attention and investment as well.
I note the work of Saul Eslake, Lisa Denny and Michael Rowan in ventilating the issues in terms of the very poor statistics and the very big challenges that are being realised within our education system, and I note the significant number of signatures they have to their open letter from eminent Tasmanians, educators and others calling for this review. That cannot be ignored. I also note the work of the Australian Education Union (AEU), the Principals Association, the Association of State School Organisations and, of course, our teachers.
Different organisations have different perspectives on the notion of a review. Some know exactly what they think should happen and it is just a matter of government getting on with it. Others think that there is significant value in looking deeply at the challenges, at the data and at the evidence, and the experience of teachers, and trying to understand that. From the Greens’ perspective, the critical thing is probably that while we accept the value of looking back and analysing and understanding the challenges, the critical part of this conversation is for Tasmania collectively to get on the same page with a plan about how we deliver education to our children; how we give them the best possible opportunities in life; how that creates the best possible community that is within our reach; and what it is going take to get there. We want to be forward looking when it comes to this.
When you talk to the teacher cohort, there is a myriad of views. There is concern about Year 11 and Year 12 in high schools; there is concern about colleges; concern about investment; and there is concern about support services. There is no unity ticket when it comes to education. One of the biggest challenges in Tasmania is the socio-economic relationship between our community and educational outcomes. This is one thing that does deserve analysis and it also means that we are not necessarily always comparing apples with apples when we look at some of the data that comes out of Tasmania and some of the data that is coming out of other states.
Whether that is because of the regional nature of Tasmania; or the socio-economic issues and demographics; or whether that is because we report on slightly different elements of the education system – is it just Year 12 completion; is it the Tasmanian Certificate of Education (TCE); is it certificates; do other jurisdictions give certificates if you have just finished, even if you did not pass? There is a lot of intricacies here that need to be teased out and there are significant challenges.
The issue that has been mentioned before by the Leader of the Opposition – about the challenges of permanency for librarians, for teachers’ aides, for Aboriginal education workers and so forth – are critical issues. It is not just about delivering good education outcomes for our students; it is about delivering good workplaces as well. It is about making sure that a school is a healthy workplace to go to; that workers in those schools feel supported and have the resources that they need and they deserve to do the job that we expect them to do – and that parents expect them to do.
Turning to the motion, I welcome the fact that this is brought on. On the first reading, I found this a bit shallow, with all due respect, and as a result, I have an amendment I would like to move. At the same time, it is important that we debate this and we look into the challenges. One of the things that is really important in the context of this motion is that a good education is not just about good, well‑paying jobs. It is about a community; it is about healthy lives; it is about the social fabric of our community; it is about environment; and it is about personal fulfilment. It is really about that.
Paragraphs (a) to (d) in the motion are largely statements of fact. I note the member for Clark disagreed with them, but they are largely statements of fact and, like I said at the start, we want any review to be really forward looking.
I have an amendment that I would like to move. I will read it and then talk to it. I move –
That the motion be amended by:
a) Omitting from clause 1 everything after ‘importance of education’ and substituting ‘to Tasmania’s future and the ability of Tasmanians to have healthy, safe, secure lives and livelihoods’;
b) Inserting in clause 2 the following paragraph before (a) ‘The significant commitment of teachers and their school colleagues to the education of young Tasmanians’;
c) Omitting from clause 2(f) everything after ‘excessive workloads’ and substituting ‘and inadequate resourcing and support contributing to substandard educational outcomes and driving some teachers from the profession’, and;
d)Omitting from clause 3 everything after ‘education’ and substituting ‘system, including the link between low socioeconomic status and educational achievement and to recommend reforms necessary to improve education and social outcomes for Tasmanian children and young people’.
We crafted these amendments relatively carefully because we did not want to detract from what the Leader of the Opposition is trying to do here in terms of raising the alarm, flying the flag and pointing to a review, but we wanted to make sure that the motion represented a broader perspective and a forward-looking perspective.
As I mentioned before, the importance of education to Tasmania’s future and the ability of any Tasmanian is not just about finding safe, secure, well‑paying jobs as is drafted in the motion. It is absolutely about that, but it is more than that. That is my point. We are not trying to detract from the notion of jobs. We understand that that is a mantra and a significant agenda of the opposition, but education is about our lives. It is about our community and it is about people and Tasmanians having healthy, safe, secure lives, and livelihoods and jobs.
We are trying to build on the framework that the Leader of the Opposition had in there because it is not all about the economy; it is not all about jobs; it is about us as human beings and how we want to be in a community.
When it comes to the second amendment, we all thought it really important in our contributions to acknowledge teachers and education workers and so forth, so I imagine that will be pretty uncontroversial. It is making sure that that is reflected in this motion. We want the significant commitment of teachers and their school colleagues to the education of young Tasmanians to be recognised in this motion.
When it comes to the third amendment, we take ‘educators are working with’ and we delete ‘excessive workloads’, substituting ‘inadequate resourcing and support’. In many ways that talks to the excessive workloads, but it speaks to the challenges, which are funding, support workers and the like, which contribute to substandard educational outcomes and drive some teachers from their profession. We are grabbing onto the thrust of what the Leader of the Opposition wanted to get here, and talking to the fact that it is about resourcing. It is about support for those teachers, and yes, it is having an impact on those teachers. Some are leaving the profession.
When it comes to the call for the independent review of the state’s education system, we are supportive of that. We are not opposed to that. We are open to that. One of the things that is most important is that it needs to be forward looking. We need to make sure that this is not just trawling through the challenges and the problems of the last decade or two – the statistics that we are getting at the moment – but that it is actually proposing a way forward and it is actually proposing how we resolve this issue.
It would be good to have a clear commitment from the government that it would be prepared to implement the recommendations of such a review because, ultimately, there has been review after review of different parts of the education system in Tasmania. They have looked at bits, they have made recommendations, and they consistently fall on deaf ears. They are consistently not picked up by the government and not funded by government. Structural changes do not happen and we end up still with mediocre educational outcomes.
I will leave my contribution at that. We feel that the amendments do not take anything away from the motion but add to the motion and add some clarity to the call on government to deal with an education system that is in crisis. It is absolutely fundamental to the future of Tasmania. It is fundamental to the fabric of our society and how we will be seeing ourselves in the world.
