Ms MANISON - 2015-04-29
Yesterday you delivered a budget that saw more cuts to public education, and you said over 700 enrolments have been lost from public schools. This has happened under your watch. Will you now concede these cuts are due to your decision to change staff formulae to reduce teacher numbers, remove many staff provided above formula, reduce teacher and staff numbers by altering attendance assessments, and to shackle schools with global school budgets based on snapshots of their profiles in 2014?
When will you take responsibility for the mess you have created and fix it instead of blaming students, parents and teachers?
ANSWER
Mr Deputy Speaker, I love the question. I do not accept anything you have said. The last comments about students, teachers and parents – no one is knocking on my door saying they are upset with the latest results in the Northern Territory.
We have real jealously here because they are upset that we are doing things. The only people putting pressure on and demonising the public education system in the Northern Territory are the Labor opposition and their mates in the union. They are the only ones demonising a damn good system which is getting better every day. Every school in the Northern Territory has more money in this budget than it had last year.
You are right, we have fewer students in the system but schools have more money. The Leader of the Opposition said yesterday he was worried about overcrowding in classrooms. Schools have the same amount of money with fewer students and you are worried about overcrowding. We have the best student teacher ratios in the country. We have well-resourced schools.
Collectively, schools around the Territory have about $39m in their budgets outside their budget allocation. If we were to bring back the Labor system that money would be stripped from schools so they could not use it. Under Labor, any excess staffing monies were taken back into the Department of Education. Under the Country Liberals that money stays with the schools and they spend it as they see fit. People at the school level are making decisions for their schools – principals and school councils.
People see the value in global school budgeting, so much so I have lines at the door of schools that want to take the next step to independent public status because it works. It gives them the autonomy to focus on what is right, and that is the students not some fat bureaucracy that Labor wants. Labor wants to centralise everything and take the power away from schools to make the decisions that make a difference to students.
I am proud of the education system in the Northern Territory. I do not demonise or attack it. I do not go to the media and spruik how bad our education system is. I promote it because it is a damn good one.
When will you take responsibility for the mess you have created and fix it instead of blaming students, parents and teachers?
ANSWER
Mr Deputy Speaker, I love the question. I do not accept anything you have said. The last comments about students, teachers and parents – no one is knocking on my door saying they are upset with the latest results in the Northern Territory.
We have real jealously here because they are upset that we are doing things. The only people putting pressure on and demonising the public education system in the Northern Territory are the Labor opposition and their mates in the union. They are the only ones demonising a damn good system which is getting better every day. Every school in the Northern Territory has more money in this budget than it had last year.
You are right, we have fewer students in the system but schools have more money. The Leader of the Opposition said yesterday he was worried about overcrowding in classrooms. Schools have the same amount of money with fewer students and you are worried about overcrowding. We have the best student teacher ratios in the country. We have well-resourced schools.
Collectively, schools around the Territory have about $39m in their budgets outside their budget allocation. If we were to bring back the Labor system that money would be stripped from schools so they could not use it. Under Labor, any excess staffing monies were taken back into the Department of Education. Under the Country Liberals that money stays with the schools and they spend it as they see fit. People at the school level are making decisions for their schools – principals and school councils.
People see the value in global school budgeting, so much so I have lines at the door of schools that want to take the next step to independent public status because it works. It gives them the autonomy to focus on what is right, and that is the students not some fat bureaucracy that Labor wants. Labor wants to centralise everything and take the power away from schools to make the decisions that make a difference to students.
I am proud of the education system in the Northern Territory. I do not demonise or attack it. I do not go to the media and spruik how bad our education system is. I promote it because it is a damn good one.
Last updated: 09 Aug 2016