Grievance Debate

Private Music Instructors

Mr GARDNER (Morialta) (15:29): I rise today to speak about music in schools. There are some critical challenges facing our young people who are learning instruments, their families and the schools that promote that, because they know that learning an instrument is good for a student's education, and of course the hundreds of private music instructors around South Australia who have no idea at this stage whether they will have a livelihood next year, as their business models and the work they have done for decades in public schools is under threat as a result of action taken by the Australian Education Union in the Industrial Relations Commission. The government has as yet been unable to address this issue. I am calling on the government to fix this issue which can, I believe, be fixed.

Members may be aware that in recent weeks this issue has caused significant stress for hundreds of private music instructors and thousands of students across the public school system. A number of schools have already advised parents that no private music instruction will be offered next year, in 2017. Other schools are currently grappling with the bureaucratic process they must now go through in order to allow private music instructors to offer tuition to students during school hours at public schools.

I understand that, despite some support from department staff—and I believe that some staff have been seconded to work on this full time—very few schools have as yet been able to fulfil the criteria they must go through, the hoops they must jump through, to offer the same level of service next year as they currently offer. I want to be very clear: this is not an issue where it should be either instrumental music service or private music instructors. It is not an either/or. Most schools that offer music, I suspect, have IMS staff (Instrumental Music Service), music teachers and private music instructors, or some combination of those different groups, working happily together for the best interests of their students, and we want that to continue.

Less than two weeks ago, I put a petition online. It has attracted nearly 1,500 signatures (1,464 at last check) of affected families who, and I quote from the petition:

Urge the Government to change the Education Department rules so that private music instructors may continue to work in public schools.

The only consideration that should be relevant is how we get the outcome that will be in the best interests of the children in our schools. That is the only thing that matters.

Reducing the range of musical instrument instructional offerings available during the school day is not in our children's best interest. It is not in the best interests of those students or their schools. The range of instrument choices, the opportunity for one-on-one tutoring and the model that works best in a local school environment are all matters that a local school should be determining, not head office.

A cascaded process has been handed down under a consent order in the Industrial Relations Commission. This was agreed to between the education union and the education department. I note that tutors, students, families and people from schools were not present when making this consent order. There is a schedule in this consent order that identifies the process that schools must go through if they want to offer private musical instrument instruction as an option for families at the schools.

It has been put to me that the most significant roadblock to music programs continuing is in demonstrating the requirement that is identified at the start of point 4 in schedule 1 of the consent order, and I quote, 'where all of the options are exhausted'. It then goes on to say that private music instructors are available. Point 3 talks about students taking on hourly paid instructors. You have the Instrumental Music Service, and that is fine, and that is the first step. If you can employ them, that is great.

There are only so many to go around, though, and they offer only so many services. Of course, each teacher does not offer tuition for every single instrument and they also do not do one-on-one tutoring until year 12, but often at years 10 and 11 certainly that is necessary, and for some instruments you need it. Point 2 addresses teachers employed at the school and point 3 is about hourly paid instructors.

Given that hourly paid instructors are paid at a much higher level than private music instructors, it is hard to maintain the current service without significant extra expense. A very challenging part of the process for many schools is demonstrating satisfactorily that they have met that part of the process. We now need the minister to make a very clear public statement, a ministerial direction or direct correspondence with schools about the application of this policy. She should make it clear that she considers schools to have fulfilled their obligations under the consent order as long as the principal or governing council can confirm that they have considered engaging HPIs.

If the principal and governing council determine that this model does not suit the school, whether for budget reasons or any other reason they consider relevant, the minister's advice should be that they have met the instructions to her satisfaction and can therefore allow families to engage PMIs (private music instructors), as many do now. I will have further words to say about this.