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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fourth Parliament, First Session (54-1)
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Bills

Education and Children's Services Bill

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 20 June 2018.)

Dr CLOSE (Port Adelaide—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (11:02): I indicate that I am the lead speaker for the opposition on the bill. It is a welcome return of this bill, as was acknowledged by the minister in introducing it. The bill went through this house before the last election, but the election intervened before it could be considered in the upper house. The bill has in fact been many years in the making. It has been talked of often but only finally surfaced in parliament last year. Let's hope and expect that it has resurfaced and will be carried through substantially in both this chamber and the other place.

It is a substantial bill and I do not propose to go through it in enormous detail, having already done so once last year and having heard the minister's speech, which similarly only lightly referred to the intricacies of the bill. However, it is worth highlighting the chief purposes for which the bill has been constructed. It is essentially a modernisation of our approach to education in the larger sense, comprising not only the school years but also the years leading up to school, which we increasingly recognise as being significant and, in many ways, almost completely determinative of the quality of education that students receive in their school years.

Those early childhood years—including how children are treated by their families, the services they receive and their early childhood educators—make an enormous difference to the experience of young people throughout school and into the rest of their lives. This bill brings together the legislation relating to those early years and the legislation relating to the school years and does so in a way that makes the services and approach as seamless as possible.

I say 'as possible' because there is of course the confounding challenge of federation, which means that early childhood is a shared responsibility, with so much of childcare services being funded and managed through the federal government. This funding is usually provided through giving tax relief to parents who send their children to child care. This results in some complexity over the capacity of the state to really drive a strong early childhood agenda, but I think we on both sides of the house have given it as good a shake as possible through this bill.

The bill was extensively consulted on, which is unsurprising given its very long gestation in the last government, but particularly leading up to the final formulation of the text that was presented last year. There are changes in the bill, and I will be asking for clarification, which may come through the closing second reading speech from the minister or in the committee stage. I will be asking for clarification on the extent of consultation that has been undertaken on those parts of the bill that have a significant or substantial change in meaning from that which was presented here. Obviously there are some editorial and consequential changes, but there are some changes that are worth discussing, and I would like to understand the degree to which consultation had occurred.

The overall thrust of the bill—the overall objective of the bill—is to simultaneously improve quality of education experiences and accessibility for our young people. There can be nothing more important for a society and a government to deal with than how we ensure not only that there is some quality that some young people have access to but that there is quality that all young people have access to.

We cannot be in a situation, which occurs in many parts of the world, where the elite are well educated, the elite are well cared for but the majority or even a substantial minority of young people do not receive the quality that they deserve and we are in fact dependent on their getting for our future prosperity. The bill certainly makes an attempt within its framework to help deliver that quality and accessibility.

Importantly—and again I appreciate that this is an utterly bipartisan approach—it also supports the promotion of the involvement of parents, caregivers, wider family and communities. It is a hackneyed phrase, which I hesitate to yet again put into Hansard, about it taking a village to raise a child, but I think it is used so often because it is so true. To simply be alone in trying to raise and educate your child with no external help is not the way that we conduct ourselves in our modern society. We appreciate there is a collective effort that is required for health services and for education services as well as additional supports, and it is absolutely essential that that not then bifurcate into, 'Well, when the kids are at school it's their business, nothing to do with the parents, the community or the wider family outside.'

The bill, both in its original form and in the form that has been delivered by the government, seeks to ensure that we fully recognise that this is a relationship between families, communities, schools and other education facilities in early childhood. We need to give that priority and weight so that as a team we provide children with the support and the education they need and deserve.

It also acknowledges the contribution of staff. A great deal of modernisation work that occurred in the version that was presented last year to parliament has been retained, simply making sure that the ways in which staff are acknowledged, recognised and supported are very clear and straightforward. On that matter, this bill and the previous legislation have increased levels of protection for staff. It is not acceptable for teachers in a school, in their place of work, to be threatened or assaulted by parents or other caregivers or by other people, who may not have a relationship with children, coming onto school property. That is simply not acceptable and of course everybody feels that way. This piece of legislation gives some more oomph, some more legislative weight, to dealing with those matters, which do occur all too frequently.

Children need to be at school. It is an obvious phrase, and we have excellent attendance numbers. Statistically the attendance has a good record when you take into account those who are either there or have a good reason not to be there. Children get sick. Every so often, parents can negotiate with teachers and principals to have children go on an educative family holiday and not attend school, but children not going to school for days and days in a term and children having a relationship with school that is regarded as optional and intermittent is extremely unhealthy. It is obvious that you cannot learn if you are not at school. It is also obvious that, if you are so disengaged as a child or as a young person that you do not want to be at school, and even when you are showing up, you are unlikely to get much education.

There was some media and other attention last year on the first prosecution that was advanced in many years under my ministerial leadership. It is a difficult one. Prosecuting parents for not supporting their kids to go to school is complex because frequently what we are talking about is a family that is struggling and needs support, rather than additional punishment. I will always support that occurring first, and hopefully that is the only ingredient that is needed.

Both ourselves and the now government—but last year the opposition—supported increasing the number of attendance officers, for example, to ensure that that level of support and engagement was indeed available through the public system, but the prosecution that we took up as the first one in a long time was a parent being wilful. It was a parent who had a business and he wanted his child to be working at that business. He sought permission for the child, who was only in year 8 and year 9, to be regarded as an apprentice, and he had been told that it was not acceptable for that age of child, but he did it anyway. I believe that is a case where prosecution is absolutely warranted.

We need to make sure that the law is as up to date as possible in regard to the extent of the punishment that awaits a parent who thinks so little of their child's education. Obviously, I do not have more up-to-date information, but I was pleased that the child was immediately back at school. The child had a positive attitude towards their education and was benefiting whenever they were able to get to school and benefiting from the result of that prosecution.

In the last piece of legislation—again, I signal this for the minister for consideration in his closing speech or in the committee stage—there was a question of whether we allow an expiation notice in order to allow for more of a gradation of escalation from support and family conference, which is included here and was included in my legislation, before you hit prosecution and the court having to make a decision and whether there was room for an expiable offence—I always try to avoid saying that on Hansard, as it is a difficult expression—but that is not in this bill. I think some of my colleagues might wish to discuss that more. I certainly think we need an answer on the advice that has been received that has led to that decision.

The other area of some question and reform of both the previous and the current bill is how we manage the teaching of religion in schools. The old legislation—the legislation currently in place that this will replace—allowed that to be done by regulation, but the regulation is extremely out of date. The regulation was created in a time when there was an expectation that essentially all students would be likely to be religious and Christian, although they might be of different denominations of Christianity, and the clergy would be able to have a list of the students of their particular denomination in the local public school. Clearly, that is not what has been taking place for a very long period of time.

We need to make sure that the legislation has caught up with that and reflects what we expect not only of a secular public education system but also of a deeply multicultural society, a society where we see children in schools who proudly have posters with their name, usually on a hand, attached to different parts of the world where they trace, if not their own birth, their parents' birth or their grandparents' birth. As the Governor so often says, we are the most multicultural nation on earth. We have the highest proportion of people who were either born overseas or at least one of their parents was born overseas. We need to acknowledge that that is a reality in our school system.

Religion itself is taught in our schools. It is part of the Australian Curriculum. Teachers teach religion—absolutely essential. If we are to understand what it is to be human, if we are to understand our current society and our history, we need to understand religions. No-one, I believe, would make an argument over that. There has, however, been this lingering question arising from the old regulation that the clergy, as it is termed in that regulation, have access to teaching students their own faith as a teaching from a non-teacher to the students in the public school system.

Our bill talked about religious and intercultural instruction—intercultural being reflective of the fact that what might be a religion for one person is just an interesting feature of a culture for somebody else, but that it was about instruction. This bill has changed that terminology to talk about activities. I will be interested in committee to inquire of the minister why that change occurred and what protections are in place to make sure that we do not start treading into activities that are absolutely part of the modern life and the historical life of our schools, which is to celebrate activities, to celebrate events that are of deep cultural significance to all of us. We will interrogate that and look at whether or not there are any amendments that might be required in the upper house.

The bill of course also puts children first. If you do not spend much time working in the field of education, child protection, or other child services, it seems to make perfect sense that of course children come first when you are talking about it. It is actually worth articulating, though, and I am glad that the government has maintained that emphasis in the legislation. I say that because I have observed how quickly adults start talking to and about other adults, and the needs and demands of children, the opinions and their views, can so easily be overlooked.

That does not mean that you have an entirely child-driven education system. When I was education minister, one of my children, who will be nameless, frequently bemoaned the fact that he did not know anyone with any power in the education system who might be able to get rid of homework. Sarcasm, good, a good skill to have. You cannot necessarily make a determination based on the desires of the moment of an individual child, but it is worth listening to and understanding what it is. One of the greatest developments that has come from South Australia in the approach to teaching and learning is TfEL, Teaching for Effective Learning. What that is about is saying that, when we are working out how to teach this, and this, and this in the Australian Curriculum, we ought to include students in how they would best learn that and how they want to explore it.

A couple of years ago, I went to Craigmore High School and was so impressed by the student leaders of that school telling me how they had not only worked out how they wanted to learn various parts of the curriculum—so in mathematics, how they wanted to apply that to working in fast food, working in the grocery store, having to purchase things at the grocery store—and how that would make it real for them, but also that they were leading discussions with the local primary school on how primary school students might have an engagement and involvement in how they would make sense of what is being provided to them through the Australian Curriculum. This idea of 'child first' has enormous power and weight, but we as adults have to make room for it. We have to explicitly choose that listening to children in their engagement and what they get out of their education and early childhood services matters.

The last element which I will raise in the context of the bill is the area for which I have already filed amendments, and that is the question of the role of the union in participating in decisions. I will talk more to that, clearly, when we get into the committee stage, about why the two amendments might make sense. There are two areas where the union is currently involved by law and, under this piece of legislation, would be excluded.

One relates to decisions about the promotion or tenure of the appointment of leaders in a school. I think that there is a role for the union in that, but where I think that there is absolutely essentially a role for the union is on the committee that a minister can set up to close a school. I have heard nothing from this minister about forcibly closing schools, so I do not make any assertions that he might be contemplating that, but I look back to the current Treasurer, who was a minister for education and he closed an enormous number of schools against the opposition of the school community, the parents, the teachers and the union.

If you are going to have a review to consider whether a school should be closed down—and it is an acceptable piece of legislation to have—then what you ought to do is have the best and strongest advice about the future of that school around the table of that review committee. At present, that means having the union there. If you exclude the union and say, no, there will just be a teacher there to represent the school, you risk taking away the power of that voice because the teacher inevitably has a view about their own future and what other school they might want to go to.

They may fight like anything for their school but ultimately be disregarded as a teacher. If the union delegate is there, though, then there may be some serious consideration of the consequences of closing the school. I will be advancing amendments to that effect in this chamber and in the other place but, overall, I want to commend the government and the minister for bringing back this piece of legislation. It was the most significant piece of legislation that I brought in as education minister.

I was disappointed that the other place ran out of time. As happens towards the end of the year, it had such a big legislative agenda backlog that it was unable to consider the bill. I know that the then opposition spokesperson, and now minister, shared my disappointment that that was the case. There was no blame thrown at any political party. It was a circumstance that we lamented but accepted. I am pleased that it is back, and I largely commend this bill to the house.

Ms LUETHEN (King) (11:22): I rise to support this bill, which will improve the support and futures of our young people in schools in South Australia. The Education and Children's Services Bill 2018 will modernise legislation for education and children's services, providing a contemporary framework for the delivery of high-quality children's services and compulsory education within South Australia. This bill incorporates amendments on a range of matters that the Liberal Party flagged in opposition are necessary for quality education in South Australia.

In particular, this bill fulfils the Marshall government's election commitments to remove the previous government's proposed central controls over school governing councils. It will entrench a legal fund for governing councils in dispute with the department, as proposed by the Debelle recommendations, and it will increase fines to deter chronic truancy. The bill repeals and replaces the Education Act 1972 and the Children's Services Act 1985, establishing a contemporary legislative framework for the delivery of high-quality education and children's services in our state.

Our children deserve access to the best schools, preschools and children's services. This bill aims to establish the conditions necessary for teachers, parents, families and communities to work together to give our children the best start in life. A key improvement is that the bill removes the central controls over school and preschool governing councils that were proposed by the former Labor government in the previous iteration of the bill. Our government believes that, by empowering school communities, we will deliver better student outcomes and have happier and more efficient school communities.

We have removed provision for the minister to direct, suspend, dissolve and establish a new governing council under disciplinary circumstances. We have also introduced changes to ensure that parents, or other persons responsible for children and students at schools, preschools and children's centres, will form the majority of the members of the governing councils of those schools and services. I speak firsthand about the value of our governing councils, having served on the Golden Grove High School governing council. I am now in my third year on the Golden Grove Primary School governing council and I regularly meet with other governing councils in the seat of King.

The bill includes provision for governing councils to access funds for independent legal advice when they are in dispute with the department. This was a specific recommendation of the Debelle royal commission. At this point, I want to take a moment to acknowledge my friend and fierce child protection advocate Danyse Soester, who was the school whistleblower whose efforts helped lead to a royal commission into sexual abuse and how we handle it in our South Australian school system. The royal commission found significant failings within the department over the handling of a sexual abuse case at a school in Adelaide's western suburbs, which had grave and long-lasting effects on the community there.

The parents and constituents of this state expect us, as a parliament and as a government, to do everything in our power to ensure that children are protected. Under this bill, the Crown Solicitor, or a nominee of the Crown Solicitor, will make a decision on whether a governing council's request meets the necessary requirements to be funded. The relevant funds will be administered by the Attorney-General's Department.

The bill will impact committee membership. This government believes that the needs of the school, preschool or children's service are not necessarily served by having staff representation on decision-making groups only available to members of the Australian Education Union. The bill removes the exclusive right of the Australian Education Union to nominate members of the relevant committees formed under the bill, including selection committees for promotional level positions in the teaching service, reclassifications and review committees considering the amalgamation or closure of a school.

The members of selection committees will now be appointed by the department's chief executive, and at least one member will be a person elected from the teaching service to represent them on such committees. For the purposes of amalgamations and closures of schools, review committees will include a staff member of each school to be nominated by their respective staff.

The bill retains the opportunity for schools and preschools to participate in religious or cultural activities. This could include a pastor coming to the school to conduct a session explaining Easter, or an imam explaining Ramadan, or perhaps a group of students attending a community prayer breakfast. These matters are dealt with in existing legislation under section 102—Religious education, of the Education Act. Subsections (1) and (2) provide:

(1) Regular provision shall be made for religious education at a Government school, under such conditions as may be prescribed, at times during which the school is open for instruction.

(2) The regulations shall include provision for permission to be granted for exemption from religious education on conscientious grounds.

At clause 82, the new bill proposes some reforms that provide some greater clarity about how this will work in practice.

Importantly, the new bill clarifies that, if such a religious or cultural activity is to take place, parents should be notified. It retains arrangements under which a parent can seek to have their child exempted from participation in such activities on conscientious grounds. A child who is exempted from such activities would be provided with an alternative activity related to the curriculum during the period in which the activities are conducted.

The bill proposes retaining the opt-out principle for families seeking that their child should be exempted. Importantly, the act will make it clear that Christmas carols may be sung in South Australian government schools and preschools. I believe this will be very well received by many King constituents, and this was certainly an issue raised with me by many constituents numerous times in my 10 months of doorknocking.

Education is key to providing opportunities for children to prosper and to contribute to their communities. Regarding attendance, the Nyland royal commission found truancy to be a significant risk factor in child protection concerns. In addition, research consistently alerts us to chronic non-attendance as a risk factor for ongoing social and economic disadvantage across a child's lifetime. The bill has multiple measures that support a student's attendance and reduce chronic truancy. The bill includes increased penalties for parents of children who are chronically absent from school and provides a broader range of measures to deal with non-attendance, including the provision for family conferencing. The purpose of family conferencing is to enable school staff to work in partnership with families to improve the attendance of their child at school.

The bill does not include a provision for the issuing of expiation notices for non-attendance as proposed by the previous Labor government. The issuing of expiation notices for these types of offences would undermine the benefits of early intervention through family conferences and support work. In addition to these strengthened provisions, the government will be auditing the attendance policies at all government schools, taking steps to ensure that children in out-of-home care are engaged in education. The government will also be increasing the number of truancy officers employed in the department by 50 per cent.

Regarding safe learning environments, the government is supportive of strong measures to protect students, teachers and other staff acting in the course of their duties from offensive behaviour or the use of abusive, threatening or insulting language. Included in the bill is the provision to suspend, exclude or expel a student from a school if a student has perpetrated violence, acted illegally or persistently interfered with the ability of a teacher to conduct their lessons.

Other measures aimed at promoting safe learning and working environments include the provision of a power for the chief executive to terminate the employment of an officer of the teaching service if the officer is not a registered teacher within the meaning of the Teachers Registration and Standards Act, or if an officer is a prohibited person within the meaning of the Child Safety (Prohibited Persons) Act 2016, and the provision for a person to be barred from a school, preschool or children's service if that person has behaved in an offensive manner while on the premises, or threatened or insulted staff, or committed or threatened to commit any other offences on or in relation to the premises.

Further measures include dealing with trespass in all schools, preschools and children's services sites; strengthening provisions for authorised persons to deal with people behaving in an unacceptable manner on a premises; mandating working with children checks for adults returning to study at schools; prohibiting the use of corporal punishment in all preschools and schools; and providing a power for the chief executive to direct a child who may pose a risk to the health, safety or welfare of other students or staff.

In relation to employment provisions for staff, staff employed within our schools, preschools and children's services are integral in providing high-quality education services to South Australian children. Staff work tirelessly to understand and respond to the learning, wellbeing and safety needs of all children in order to provide them with the best opportunity to succeed. This bill brings together and strengthens the employment provisions for teachers and support workers in government schools, preschools and children's services under a single act. The bill also enables the attraction and retention of high-quality teachers to public schools experiencing challenges in recruiting the high-quality staff they require to achieve outcomes.

This bill supports schools and preschools to retain quality leaders and teachers, including enabling the extensions of teachers in promotional appointments initially made through a formal merit selection process without having to undergo a further merit selection process when the staff member is performing well. This provides the opportunity also for the chief executive to employ a broader range of staff in schools and preschools, including nurses, social workers, youth workers and allied health professionals to provide support services to students.

This will provide flexibility to schools to respond to the needs of their local community. It also continues to provide access for teachers to the South Australian tribunal for a review of the decision or determination of the CE made in relation to their employment. This ensures that teachers are not subject to any unreasonable or arbitrary decisions by their employer.

Another great thing about this bill is the improved information sharing. It will ensure that students experience continuity with their learning, safety and wellbeing, which is vitally important in providing a high-quality education service. This bill includes a number of provisions to improve information sharing between government and non-government schools, preschools, children's service centres and the department where necessary to support the education, health, safety or welfare of the child. This is another area where I have had direct feedback from principals when they have had concerns over the safety of a child and other children who might be impacted by that child moving between schools.

The bill also includes important safeguards to protect personal information from unauthorised disclosure or misuse. This bill resolves a number of operational and legal issues associated with the current legislation. Significant public consultations on the reform of the Education Act and Children's Services Act have occurred to get the bill to this point. Successive attempts to modernise the Education Act have suffered in the past from half-hearted interest by former governments.

Mr Speaker, I thank you for the opportunity to speak on this bill today to improve the learning outcomes of South Australian children and I thank the Minister for Education for fulfilling the Marshall government's election commitments to the people of South Australia. Again, we are delivering. Teachers play such an important role in the development of a child and I am so blessed to have been able to have such a fantastic network of schools across the electorate of King. I commend the bill.

Ms COOK (Hurtle Vale) (11:37): I welcome the opportunity to speak to the Education and Children's Services Bill before the house today. We know from the tremendous contribution of the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, the member for Port Adelaide, that this bill in its current form is a reintroduction and, in essence, the re-establishment of a bill of the former Labor government that was introduced into this place in 2017 and lapsed in the upper house prior to the election.

The bill seeks to overhaul and modernise the legislation governing both school and preschool education in South Australia and combines the Children's Services Act with the Education Act. In government, Labor undertook extensive consultation with the sector—with unions, teachers, principals and parents—to ensure that our legislation was fit for purpose and in the interests of those at the coalface of education in South Australian schools, teachers and students.

Of course, the 2017 bill was delayed. It ultimately did not progress to the vote required in the other place due largely to extensive amendments that were moved by the then Liberal opposition, movements that sought to divorce the Australian Education Union (AEU) from key sections of the act. It is unsurprising that, come to this iteration of the bill in 2018, again the Australian Education Union has been targeted and maligned in this bill, with the Marshall Liberal government seeking to remove the AEU from the legislative review process currently used to determine the sustained viability of schools throughout South Australia, including decisions involving the operation of a school and a selection panel process overseeing the employment and promotion of schoolteachers and principals.

What we are seeing is another sad attempt by the Marshall Liberal government to destroy the AEU and, in general, the union movement more broadly. The AEU is a union that has worked tirelessly to improve educational standards and working conditions in South Australian schools for decades. Regardless of what those opposite might be interjecting, the AEU is an unaligned union. They are no Labor stooges, nor are they in any Labor member's pocket.

Mr Cregan interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Kavel will not interject.

Ms COOK: The AEU has a long and proud history of advocating for policy positions against governments of both political persuasions, and I recall from our time in office that the AEU often took a stance against Labor government policy. They protested most loudly around instrumental instruction in schools and changes in that regard, and of course changes were made to how we were undertaking the assessment of competency of numeracy and literacy.

I recall some loud protests about the transfer from the written form to online assessment. It has been proven now that it can be done successfully, and it is being undertaken in schools, but they were very loud in their protests about that and other ways of assessing numeracy and literacy in schools. There is a whole range of examples of how they protested against things that we were doing.

The relationship between the labour movement and the Australian Education Union has at times been a difficult one. They certainly have their own priorities and positions, and I have mine, but I forever respect them for taking up the fight to any government—Liberal, Labor, state or federal—and prosecuting the case for what they believe to be in the best interests of teachers and students.

Under the government's proposal, the role of the AEU will be supplanted by a teacher, with which we on this side of the house do not agree. This is because school review committees undertake the extremely critical role of reviewing a school's educational offerings and making key recommendations to the minister about the future of the school, including any possible amalgamations.

Without this key input of the AEU into the process, we are likely to see ministerial bias creep into the review process, with small schools, schools with decreasing enrolments or schools located in supposed safe Labor seats at risk. The Marshall Liberal government also wants to remove the AEU from the merit selection panel utilised to hire principals and teachers applying for promotion. The presence of an identified AEU representative on specific merit selection panels—

An honourable member interjecting:

Ms COOK: It was very quiet before you came in here this morning. The presence of an identified AEU representative on specific merit selection panels has ensured that principals and teachers of merit are rewarded and that fair and proper processes are adhered to. It is a very important process. For merit selection to be truly successful, there must be a high level of trust and faith in the entire process, including from the point of view of establishment of the panel.

Through the provision of AEU representation on merit selection panels, the Education Act currently provides a layer of protection against manipulation in a merit process. In order to be eligible to participate in any merit selection panel, AEU representatives are required to attend a full-day education training session with the department, followed by follow-up retraining, at least every five years.

The Department for Education does not have the same requirement for non-AEU panellists, which can often result in panellists who have not received any merit training being involved for up to 15 years. It is clearly a poorly conceived and executed attempt to stamp out unionism from the South Australian education sector. Should this bill succeed in its current form, our schools, teachers and students will be a force for it.

I am getting also very tired of hearing the rhetoric about Christmas carols being in danger of being cut from our education system. The only people who seem to be predicating this argument are Liberals and some other Independent people around the place.

Members interjecting:

Ms COOK: Indeed. Carols are a very popular part of Christmas for children in our schools. I look forward to celebrating Christmas in a number of my excellent local schools in Hurtle Vale and attending as many Christmas functions as I can. I look forward to sharing, for many years to come, my extraordinarily terrible carol-singing voice with every single one of them in the seat of Hurtle Vale. I look forward to hearing both the shadow minister for education, and the Minister for Education should he wish to come down, sing carols alongside me at any of our wonderful schools.

We should take this opportunity to commit to ensuring, in an informed manner, that everybody understands what everyone's individual rights and cultures are, that the celebration of Christmas is a respectful process across a whole range of multicultural backgrounds and that everyone has the right to share in their celebrations of a whole range of festivals, as we did most recently with Diwali.

I thank my schools in the electorate of Hurtle Vale, and more broadly in South Australia and, with discussion around amendments, I commend the bill to the house.

Mr PEDERICK (Hammond) (11:46): I rise to speak to the Education and Children's Services Bill 2018. After hearing the comments of the member for Hurtle Vale, I commend the Minister for Education because, obviously, this piece of legislation is a large and imminent threat to the Australian Education Union. If that be it, that be it. I declare up-front that my wife is a public servant and works for the Department for Education. She has worked in schools in both metropolitan and country areas, which gives me a little insight into some of the things that go on in our education system.

Last week, I was a bit intrigued with The Advertiser outing, so to speak, our Register of Members' Interests, as if that was news. It is a public document. Everyone can see what we have registered as our interests. I guess it was news. It is available on a public website and you can see all our interests, including the fact that my wife works for the Department for Education.

Right across the board, from talking to people across my electorate and across the education system, I must say that I have a very good relationship with the current Minister for Education, and across that stark political divide I have had a reasonable relationship with the former minister, the member for Port Adelaide. I have learnt that when you are in opposition, the only way to get on is to try to negotiate with ministers. We had some great wins, including $20 million for the Murray Bridge High School.

Having said that, I recently met with minister Gardner, the member for Morialta, regarding Meningie Area School. There was a funding shortfall and, much to the delight of the chair of the governing council, the money came through. I was very pleased with that outcome. It will give the right result for a school that has a high number of Aboriginal students but is also a vital part of the state connecting to students—obviously because it is in MacKillop—from MacKillop and Hammond to make sure that we get the right educational outcomes.

What I have observed over time is interesting. I heard the discussion about the fear of this legislation knocking out everything the Australian Education Union has done. Some of the information I have heard is about how some teachers—and we have some very good teachers, do not get me wrong; we have some excellent people working in the education department—for a range of reasons are only present about 50 per cent of the time for their classes. People can challenge that, and that is fine, but I do not know of another job in the world where you can have that amount of extended leave and keep your job—but if that is the way it works, that is the way it works.

However, in my mind, what that does not do is uphold the mantra of education of putting the children first. We should always be cognisant of that fact—that we should be putting the children first at all times. I think interruptions of teachers gives plenty of opportunity for temporary relief teachers (TRTs)—and they do great work filling in when they need to—but I am intrigued at the amount of time some so-called permanent staff do not turn up, and that is a fact.

I would also like to comment on what the member for Hurtle Vale tried to portray as the evil that the Liberal Party is putting onto education across the state, when against some strong discussion in the party room and elsewhere we have put $100 million into what is essentially a safe Labor seat in the electorate of Giles. That is hardly partisan politics. There is $100 million for a new school at Whyalla because we are the Marshall Liberal government and we do not just govern for Adelaide, we do not just govern for part of the regions, we govern for the whole of South Australia.

To hear the fallacy that everything is partisan and that we are only here for certain sectors is just fabrication. I am also glad to see what minister Gardner is doing as far as working through a new antibullying program in our schools and keeping our kids safe. The safe schools program was totally inappropriate and only looked after a minority of students. People can challenge that if they like—that is fine. Our policy of looking after schools right across the state, no matter whether they are in Labor or Liberal electorates or marginal seats, is that we want to look after all the children to make sure that they have a safe education, a valued education, and work through all the issues of the modern era. I commend the minister for working through those proposals as well.

Education generally is challenging. It is the second most expensive portfolio, the one with the second highest budget behind health. That shows how serious governments of both sides take education, and so they should because we need to sow the seeds in young people and get them up to speed, whether they become university graduates or tradies. No matter where they land, we want to make sure that there is not only a future for those students but also a great future for this state.

This bill is about getting the legislation modernised to provide a contemporary framework for the delivery of high-quality children's services and compulsory education within our great state. It is certainly similar to the former government's bill that was debated last year in this place, but there are a number of amendments that we on this side of the house flagged when we were in opposition. In fact, part of the election commitments we have made is to remove the previous government's proposed central controls over schools' governing councils and entrench a legal fund for governing councils in dispute with the department, as proposed in recommendations from the Debelle inquiry, and also to introduce legislation to increase fines to deter chronic truancy.

As I said, our children deserve the best access to our best schools, preschools and children's services. This bill aims to establish the conditions necessary for everyone involved, whether they be teachers, parents, families or communities, to work together to give our children the best start in life. This bill removes the central controls over school and preschool governing councils. We on this side of the house also believe that by empowering school communities we will deliver better student outcomes and have happier and more efficient school communities.

We have also removed the provision for the minister to direct, suspend, dissolve and establish a new governing council under disciplinary circumstances. There are also changes introduced to ensure parents or other persons responsible for children and students at schools, preschools and children's centres will form the majority of members of the governing councils of those schools and services.

I must commend the many parents and caregivers from right across the state who give up their valuable time to take a leading role on governing councils to seek the best outcomes for their children and the children they care for. The bill also includes provision for governing councils to access funds for independent legal advice when they are in dispute with the department. This was another specific recommendation of the Debelle royal commission.

In regard to committee membership, we certainly believe on this side of the house that the needs of the school, preschool or children's service are not necessarily served by having staff representation on decision-making groups available only to members of the Australian Education Union. That is because, quite frankly, we do not think the Education Union should have a stranglehold on those positions. We are the party of freedom of choice. Why not open it up?

I know the member for Hurtle Vale is shaking in her boots and thinking that this bill is just going to destroy the union. Well, if it does, it does, but I would be a little surprised. What this legislation does is remove the exclusive right of the Australian Education Union to nominate members of the relevant committees formed under the bill, including selection committees for promotional level positions in the teaching service, reclassifications and review committees considering the amalgamation or closure of a school.

I am not sure what the member for Hurtle Vale was concerned about, because why not have representation from across the board, whether they are union members or not? If these positions are based on merit, surely merit should be the winner of the day in these committee positions or promotional positions being discussed at this level. If merit was the one true arbiter, why do we have to be less prescriptive about who is on those committees and who prescribes whether or not someone has the ability?

Regarding the discussion around religious and cultural activities, the bill retains the opportunity for schools and preschools to participate in religious or cultural activities. Obviously, that could involve education around Christian activities, or it could be other religious instruction, but there will be the obvious protocols for parents and their students as to whether they attend, and they will be put in place so that people can get the right outcomes for their family. I think we have to enshrine that right for religious participation.

It was interesting to hear the member for Hurtle Vale's contribution about Christmas carols. She is trying to make it sound as though the possible future of Christmas carols is a big beat-up by Liberals and some crossbenchers. Funny as it may sound, I was not born yesterday, and there are moves from some on the left to get Christmas carols out of schools. I contend the relaxed view of the member for Hurtle Vale that Christmas carols are not under threat because there has been intense media discussion at times and over many years around Christmas carols.

One thing that really disappoints me in life is when people decide that their way is the right way and they do not have an open mind to other discussion. They say, 'How dare we have Christmas carols. How dare we have religious instruction.' Seriously! It is good to see that this legislation upholds both Christmas carols and the rights of religious education at schools, and this is dealt with in existing legislation under section 102 of the Education Act.

I talked about attendance. Education is the key to providing opportunities for children to prosper and to contribute to their communities. In regard to royal commissions, I talked about Debelle, but the Nyland royal commission found truancy to be a significant risk factor in child protection concerns. In addition, research consistently alerts us to chronic non-attendance as a risk factor for ongoing social and economic disadvantage across a child's lifetime.

I know that to assist students who may not fit in the mainstream of attending the standard classroom arrangement a range of things have been put in place. For example, Murray Bridge High School has the EDGE program, and I hosted them here in Parliament House not that long ago, and there are also other programs where children are taught off site because that is how they work. I commend everyone involved in these programs for making sure that kids with those requirements can be educated because we get one chance to get these children through, whether it is at those places or in what we would call our more traditional education system.

What I will say in my closing brief comments is that we must always do what we can to make sure that we put the children first because if we do that we will be putting our state and our community first.

Mr BOYER (Wright) (12:04): I rise to add my broad support to the bill, which, as other speakers have already said this morning, is a much-needed modernisation of a very important act. I think it is a great shame that it did not successfully pass the other place in the last term of the parliament. I understand that the sticking point was the representation of the Australian Education Union on the committees that make a recommendation to the minister about whether or not a school will amalgamate or close. I think it is a fairly minor point in what is an otherwise very large bill that deals with a lot of very serious matters at schools, and it is a great shame that this bill was not enacted and in place at the start of the 2018 school year because of such a minor disagreement.

Nevertheless, I would like to talk a little bit about, first, those committees. My understanding of how a school can be closed or amalgamated is that it can happen in two different ways. The parent community of the school that is to close or amalgamate with another school can ask for a vote of the parent community, so it can self-initiate its own amalgamation or closure. However, if the government of the day—the minister or the education department—wished to override the decision of that parent body, if their decision was not to close or amalgamate or they wished to initiate their own closure or amalgamation separately, they could ask the committee that has been the source of much discussion this morning to hold a review into that planned closure or amalgamation.

Why do I think this provision in the bill is so important this time around and why is it potentially more important in this term of government than the last? As the member for Port Adelaide and the deputy leader said earlier, I do not know whether or not this government has an agenda to close schools, but the now Treasurer of South Australia, the Hon. Rob Lucas in the other place, was education minister in the 1990s and certainly a lot of schools were closed then, so I do not think it is too much of a leap to say that this government has some ideas around closing schools as well.

There are a couple of things that could potentially make that a lot easier to do. The first is the movement of year 7 into high school, probably the biggest education policy this government took to the last election. What it will mean is that all those primary schools that currently have year 7 students studying on their campus will have them progressively moved to a neighbouring high school campus. As many members in this place will know, at many primary schools the year 7 cohort is often the biggest cohort of students at that school.

We have a lot of small schools in South Australia; that is the nature of being a very large state with a lot of rural, regional and remote areas. Quite simply, if year 7 students were taken away from those primary school campuses some of them would become unviable in terms of their numbers. So although this government may say it does not have an agenda to close or amalgamate schools, the policy to move year 7 students to high school, coupled with the changes to the review committee that removes the Australian Education Union from that committee, is a very effective Trojan horse in terms of having closures or amalgamations of schools under the guise of simply moving kids from a primary school setting to a secondary school setting.

As previous members on this side of the chamber, the member for Port Adelaide and the member for Hurtle Vale, have said, it is really important to keep representation of the Australian Education Union on those committees. They play a very important role and are fierce advocates for public education. I know that no-one on this side of the house would like to see primary schools closed, and I am sure there are no members on the other side who would like to see primary schools closed in their electorates either.

I would like to offer my support for the provision in the bill that deals with offensive behaviour directed at teachers in different settings. As local members of parliament, many of us spend a lot of time at schools talking not just to students but also to staff, and in particular to principals. I have been making an effort to get around and have regular meetings with the principals in my area, and I have asked them what the big issues are for them. What is coming up more and more often is the way teachers are treated now, particularly by parents.

This is something I was intimately aware of, given that my father was a high school teacher in public schools for 40 years. He recently retired from a regional school, and he also told me that what he had noticed had changed most over his 40 years as a public school teacher was the way teachers are treated now, particularly by parents.

Yes, behaviour from students had changed too, and not always for the better, but he said there was a time when, if you were to call the parent of a student in your class and say, 'I'm John's (or Jane's) English teacher. His (or her) behaviour hasn't been up to scratch. Marks are down and he (or she) is disruptive in class,' that parent would take on face value that the teacher was telling the truth and providing that feedback to the parent in the best interests of the child.

The principals in my area tell me, and my father told me of his experience, that that has changed greatly. What you see now is parents who become verbally abusive to teachers if the feedback is given on the phone or who sometimes even become physically threatening towards teachers if it is provided face to face. They always tend to take the side of their child, and in many cases they accuse the teacher of having some kind of vendetta against the child. Not only is that incredibly disrespectful to the teachers themselves but it is also not in the best interests of the child when the teacher is actually trying to provide some honest feedback about how the behaviour of that child needs to improve.

So I am very pleased to see that this bill keeps the provisions around what constitutes offensive behaviour towards teachers. It is now quite rightly expanded beyond what I think was probably the only method in which parents could, for want of a better word, abuse teachers in the past, which was probably on the phone or face to face. Now, unfortunately, in an age when we have social media and kids at school with text messages and things like that, often it is directed towards our teachers in different forums—it might be online forums or in SMSs and different things like that.

It is good to see that this bill is seeking to expand the protection, which is quite rightly afforded to those teachers, to those other forums as well. After all, we have probably heard in this house already, just in this term of parliament, that people on many occasions praise our teachers for the role that they perform. We can all admit that the role they play in our society is undervalued, and we need to make sure that we preserve or enhance the role to be something that people aspire to doing.

With the way that teachers are treated by parents and others in this day and age, and often with the behaviour of students that teachers are responsible for mediating, I think there is a very great risk that teaching is not really a profession of choice. That is why it is so important to have clauses like this in the bill that protect our teachers so that they feel safe in their workplace and feel respected and welcomed. In the future, that will lead to us being able to attract a very high quality of graduate and applicant for the roles in our schools.

Other members today have also touched upon the improved information-sharing clauses in the bill, which I would also like to briefly speak to. As you get older, one year in your life is not such a great deal. However, if you are eight or nine years of age and at primary school and moving from your school to a different school, if for some reason the academic results and the information about your development are not passed on to the new school, as they should be, it can affect one year of schooling at your new school, which can be extremely detrimental and derail your entire education.

I am very pleased to see that the bill keeps the provisions from the bill that was before parliament in the last term of parliament around making sure that the principal of the school to which the student is transferring can request information from the principal of the school that they are leaving to make sure that their education picks up exactly where it was left off and that nothing is missed.

Regarding truancy, I will refer to my earlier comments about the treatment that teachers receive at the hands of parents. One of the issues that is born out of that ordinary behaviour from parents and the abuse that is sometimes projected towards teachers is that it is now even more difficult to deal with kids who are chronically truant from school. I note that there are some changes to this bill compared with the bill that passed this place in the last term of parliament. Notably, I think they are around the previous government's proposal to have an expiation system for cases of chronic truancy, where parents were refusing to make sure that their kids were attending school.

I know it seems like a very heavy stick to use. I understand that expiating people for things like that is a big step, but that proposal was born out of years and years of data and attempts to motivate these parents through other methods to play a role in making sure that their child actually attended school. I think it is fair to say that those other methods failed.

Whilst I welcome the government's focus on increasing by 50 per cent the number of truancy officers, or attendance officers, in schools—that is fantastic, and it is always important that, where we can, we use positive methods to encourage school attendance—there is a really tight, hard cohort of parents who are recklessly unwilling, I guess, to play any role at all in making sure that their child goes to school. In the example used by the member for Port Adelaide, a parent was actually trying to use his 14-year-old child, I think it was, who would otherwise have been attending year 8, as part of his business as an apprentice.

The point I am trying to make is that the attendance officers, as good as they might be in some cases, are not going to have any effect on that cohort of parents who are reckless as to their own child's education. The expiation notices were recommended to try to have some kind of effect in those really difficult cases, and I am disappointed to see that they are being withdrawn from this bill because at the end of the day it is not, of course, the parent who really suffers; it is the child whose education is completely forsaken who suffers. That is what we are going to see here because these attendance officers are not going to have any success with that really difficult cohort of parents who just refuse to engage or to encourage their child to go to school.

In closing, I think it is good to see that the government has moved swiftly to reintroduce this bill. It is good to see that there is support from both sides of the house. In a lot of the matters dealt with in this bill, I think it is important to put party politics aside and to work together. I look forward to seeing these provisions enacted. Once they are in place, I will certainly be out in my community, in the electorate of Wright, talking to principals and teachers to see what the effect is. I hope there are positive effects, and I look forward to speaking at a later date in the house about how successful this bill has been.

The Hon. V.A. CHAPMAN (Bragg—Deputy Premier, Attorney-General) (12:17): I rise to speak on the Education and Children's Services Bill 2018. It is a bill that repeals the Education Act 1972, and also the Children's Services Act 1985, and substantially reforms a number of other areas of legislation that deal with the administration, the registration of teaching and the like to support the educational institutions and the standards of those in South Australia.

I commend the Minister for Education for bringing this bill to the parliament. It follows some comprehensive work done by the former government, and I think it is to their credit that they did, in the final dying days of the 16 years of Labor administration, finally act on the reviewing of this legislation. In 1972, I was still in school, and it is very concerning to me that it has taken decades to actually review this.

When I first came into the parliament in 2002, the then member for MacKillop had just completed a major inquiry in relation to the review of the act. One of the stumbling blocks appeared to be reforms in relation to child care. That was an area of interest to me because in my pre-political life, at the time as a young mother, I served to support the establishment of family day care in South Australia, which I am proud to say is still operating today. It is an important form of child care available to parents. It is also something that is critical, and often the only available child care, in country and regional parts of South Australia, so it was a very important initiative.

It was established by 1979 into the early 1980s in order to enable management and regulation by the state administration. In other states, it had been developed under local government management. We felt it was important, not necessarily for child protection in those days but in relation to the significance of ensuring a high standard of care was provided by those who were going to undertake this work in their homes. We on this side of politics, and I personally, have always supported rigorous regulation in this area, so it has been developed.

I have to say that childcare centres were embryonic in the 1970s, other than in community-care settings, but they have certainly been a very important available service. Again, they have been regulated by the state to ensure that parents and families are able to pursue their employment and other activities. They also provide backup and security for vulnerable families who need support in that regard.

A lot happened back in the 1970s, but not much has happened since. Under the Brown and Olsen administrations, there was a significant strengthening of school governing councils, and I applaud that. I applaud the current minister for ensuring that our governing councils are able to operate with a level of independence but also with support, and that parents have the chance to have a real say in relation to their children's education.

Many members know that I spent 11 years at Parndana area school, and I am very pleased to have had an excellent public education. Year 12 was not available at that school at the time. Parents had fought a long, hard battle to get year 12 at the school and they finally won, but it was not available in my day. If you wanted to study year 12 or matriculation, it was known that you would come to Adelaide. I think it was a sad day when, under the previous Labor government, Parndana area school became a campus under the Kangaroo Island school structure. We now have children who travel to the Parndana campus and then have to get on a bus to travel to Kingscote for some of their lessons. Sometimes, staff and/or students from the other campus do that travelling.

As I said, I think that was a sad day. Parents fought very hard against that, and now the Parndana campus no longer offers years 11 and 12; in fact, I think even year 10 is at risk. For local communities, it means that parents of children who are 10, 11 or 12 years of age have to start making decisions about where they are going to live and whether they might have to leave a regional centre because the education facilities are simply not available for their children. I can remember one of the members of the former government's education committee coming over—what was her name? She had red hair and thought potholes were a tourist attraction.

Mr Pederick: You're kidding me?

The Hon. V.A. CHAPMAN: I do not mean to be disrespectful. This former Labor member was commissioned to go to Kangaroo Island and look at how they might try to shut down the Parndana campus to make it—

Mr Pederick: Gay Thompson.

The Hon. V.A. CHAPMAN: Ms Thompson. I do not mean any disrespect; I just cannot remember her electorate. She was in the southern area—

Mr Pederick: The former member for Reynell.

The Hon. V.A. CHAPMAN: Reynell, I am advised by the whip. She was sent to Kangaroo Island to try to restructure all of this. At that stage, the proposal of the then government, under minister Trish White, was to shut down the Parndana campus from years 1 to 5. That was going to be it. Ten-year-old children were expected to sit on a bus for 2½ hours in the morning and 2½ hours at night, to go back and forth. They had no understanding of the importance of education facilities for children in regional areas.

Concerned as we were, I have to say that I think the decision made by the government of the day, under minister Lomax-Smith, to sell off a whole lot of campuses and build superschools was most devastating to education. Some have been reasonably successful, but many of the children in them are not able to succeed because they are living in an environment where there are thousands of children on campus and it just does not suit every child. It is so typical of the Australian Labor Party. They have a mantra of one size fits all, and the result is that not all children, especially if they have high needs, have an opportunity to obtain the best outcome.

I commend the previous government for at least starting to get active in repealing this act and giving it some reform, giving it some contemporary focus, but they threw it in during the last session and of course it lapsed and did not progress. I was privileged to be appointed as the shadow minister by the Hon. Rob Kerin when I first got into parliament. Sure, I had children of my own go through the public and independent sector, and they enjoyed a good education. My grandchildren are now in the sectors, and I have been very impressed with the level of education and support that they have had in their schools, first at Glen Osmond Primary School and now at others.

I just make this point, though: my electorate has changed in the last 16 years. I have been very privileged to represent areas covering Crafers Primary School and Uraidla Primary School, which were beautiful little Adelaide Hills schools, but they were not at their fullest capacity and there was an opportunity for further attendance there. Boundaries change, and I have lost the representation of those schools, which are now ably represented, of course, in the electorates of the members for Heysen and Morialta.

I can recall an occasion when the member for Cheltenham, then minister for education, visited the Uraidla school, and I attended with him, to welcome the children from Inverbrackie, whose families were in detention there for a temporary period. The minister, I am pleased to say, at least went to meet with these children. These were highly articulate and often multilingual children who were coming to the school, and they added a very big change of dimension to the children at the school.

They were welcomed, and I cannot commend the community highly enough for welcoming the children. I must say that I did arrive with a box of cherries, which, in the area around Summertown and Uraidla, are as big as peaches. I saw lots of very happy Inverbrackie children with red mouths and cherry juice running down their faces. I think the member for Cheltenham said to me, 'Yes, you have outdone me on that contribution.'

Under recent boundary changes, Rose Park is a primary school that I have been extremely proud to represent. It is symbolic of Burnside, Linden Park and Marryatville primary schools, all schools in my electorate that are overloaded. We have children on the rafters. We have regular lessons in the resource centres because there is no adequate classroom space. Every inch has been built on. We have multistorey buildings, for example. There are now over 1,000 students at Linden Park Primary School, a school campus that was built for 300 to 400. It has had some magnificent redevelopment on it, but it is to accommodate the fact that it is extremely popular.

People move into South Australia, into Adelaide, into the seat of Bragg, so they can get access to these schools. Zoning is something that has to be enforced, like High Court Rules. It is necessary because it is such a popular area for public education. I do not want to in any way detract from independent schools in the electorate that are also regulated effectively under this act by the minister and the department, but I make the point that these are very attractive schools. Marryatville High School is highly sought after, especially when such schools and the neighbouring Glenunga International High School have an extremely good international reputation. They are highly sought after.

I thank the new minister for advocating and convincing the Marshall team in the run-up to the election and now in government to advance the transfer of year 7 to middle or high school campuses. It will give immediate relief in my electorate. There is not a lot of room at Marryatville High School because they are also so popular. Obviously, we will need to have some immediate relief in our primary schools because they are chock-a-block. I thank the minister because it will give us some immediate relief. We will have to work on where they are going to go to high school.

The city campus, which is a new school that is being established near the old Royal Adelaide Hospital site, is an important initiative of the former government because Adelaide High School is already full again. There was no provision for the children of the northern suburbs and North Adelaide and surrounds for a public school, so we clearly needed a city campus. That is all well and good, but it is already subscribed.

The new development on the Glenside Hospital site neighbouring my electorate is going to have multiple dwellings, but there is absolutely no provision for education services in the new city campus because it is going to be filled up with other children who are already on their way to being registered there. We have a high demand. We have a high standard. Whilst we want to maintain that, we are going to have to think about how we deal with that in the future.

Obviously, having gone into government after 16 years of opposition and seen myriad reports in relation to the development of child protection laws in this state, our educational facilities and childcare centres not only have a role in providing for education and are the great equaliser of opportunity for our children but they are also a place of sanctuary for our children. We as parents and those of us in the parliament who are in leadership roles should never underestimate the significance of education, the advancement and employment opportunities and the value of work and the contribution our children and grandchildren will make in due course. It is also a sanctuary of protection.

Our teachers, amongst others, have a mandatory reporting obligation in relation to child protection and they are trained in identifying where children may be at risk. Whilst there has been a spotlight shone on institutional child sexual abuse in the last decade covering South Australia in the royal commission and the more recent national royal commission, we know full well that the stranger danger talks that were given to our children in their early years deal with just a miniscule profile of child abuse behaviour.

Whilst institutional abuse in educational, church or charitable facilities has had that spotlight shone on them, the overwhelming and significant area of protection that is demanded for our children in this area is familial abuse. I say that today in the context of this bill because it is not only the greater proportion of where our children are at risk but it highlights for us the need to ensure the safety of a child who presents at school, where they spend a very large portion of their daylight hours between the ages of three to four and up to 16 or 17 and sometimes beyond.

It is an area where, if there is a problem in that child's life in their family and home life outside of the school, our teachers are trained and alert to pick up the indicia that might shine as an aspect of risk for those children and enable that to be reported and acted on. That is a very important role because children largely like and trust their teachers; sometimes, they do not like them universally. I can think of one or two I was not too keen on at school, but largely there is a high level of respect for them. Very often, they forge a relationship in the school community that enables them to convey or seek out some support to ultimately disclose things that are happening in their home that should not happen.

Whether it is in an abusive model or whether it is direct neglect, these are things that are important. I cannot express how much appreciation I have for the many good teachers and staff in the school environment who take that role very seriously and act to try to ensure that children are not only protected but nurtured through an opportunity to be able to safely grow up and of course achieve their greatest opportunity and outcomes for their future.

The other thing I would briefly say is that contemporary issues are important. Bullying in schools is an area where it is a very effective catchment to enable us to help children be protected against cyberbullying, particularly between children. This is not something we are looking to overcriminalise, although there are about eight different offences under the Criminal Law Consolidation Act which could actually relate to many acts of bullying, even between children, and obviously if aged over 10 they can be prosecuted. We need to set up structures that deal with this and deal with the very harmful aspects of bullying via a device between children.

We are working with the Minister for Education, the Attorney-General's Department, the Department of Human Services and our very own member assisting in relation to domestic and family violence to make sure that we have an environment within our schools. We are looking at family conferencing and a number of other areas in this regard, together with the backup of the police, where required, to make sure that we provide that sanctuary of safety.

Whilst there are a number of other contemporary issues, members have raised the continuation of other important aspects of this bill, including the protection of parents, staff and other children in relation to unacceptable conduct by others who come onto school grounds. The former government's insistence, having foreshadowed a reinstatement of the union representative rather than recognising and respecting the rights of teachers to be able to nominate their own representative, whether they are a union representative or not, I think is very narrow minded. I am disappointed that they have not recognised the importance of what parents and teachers want in relation to their advocates in this area.

Finally, part 11 sets out some appeal processes, which are an important protection for parents if they are unhappy with a decision of a chief executive or a minister—appeal to the District Court and, for people employed as staff, to the South Australian Employment Tribunal. I thank the Minister for Education for presenting the bill, and I look forward to seeing it pass.

Ms WORTLEY (Torrens) (12:38): I rise to speak briefly on the Education and Children's Services Bill 2018, which, as I understand it, will repeal and replace the Education Act 1972 and the Children's Services Act 1985 and is in fact a combination of these acts with some changes. I would like to begin by acknowledging the work carried out by the former minister, now Deputy Leader of the Opposition and shadow minister, the member for Port Adelaide, who, like me, is passionate about the role of education for all.

There are, however, in the bill before us today some significant changes to the bill that was introduced last year by Labor. One that causes considerable concern among many of the teachers I have spoken with is the removal of a nominee of the AEU, the Australian Education Union, on committees formed under the bill, including review committees, considering the amalgamation or closure of a school, and for selection committees for promotional level positions.

The AEU has as its staff and in elected positions within its structure those from the education workforce. Its representatives include experienced teachers and SSOs, and as a former teacher and having served as a workplace representative on the area and state councils and various committees, I know that the education of children in our schools is at the forefront of everything the Australian Education Union does.

The significance of having an AEU nominee on those committees should not be undervalued. AEU reps are trained in the department's joint training on the merit selection policy and procedures, and they adhere to the proper process for merit selection panels for principal and teacher promotions. That is their role: they are on that committee and they ensure that these processes are adhered to. Each AEU representative has a full day of training carried out at least every five years. The other representatives on those committees do not necessarily have that recent, up-to-date training.

Removing the AEU from these committees, the merit selection panels and panels looking at school closures and amalgamations is not in the best interest of our schools. The minister has representatives on the committees looking at school amalgamations. The principal of the school is on the committee. The school governing council has a representative on the committee. The AEU has one nomination, so how the member for Hammond can speak about the AEU having a stronghold on these committees defies reality. Perhaps he should go and speak more widely to the teachers at his local schools to see what their views are.

An AEU representative on these panels provides another layer of protection to ensure that the process is not manipulated. Having spoken with teachers, I know that they feel that having the AEU on merit selection panels for teachers and leadership positions is, in fact, a positive thing. The current situation of the AEU representative being the only panel member not selected by the school principal or the chair of the panel makes this very necessary in itself.

There are a lot of positives in this Education and Children's Services Bill 2018, including expectations of parent behaviour towards our hardworking teachers, as outlined in the offensive behaviour clause. Of course, we all support ensuring safe learning and working environments in our education facilities at all levels, from preschool through to university. Another aspect of the bill relates to school non-attendance, commonly referred to as truancy. We all know the importance of children attending school. While this bill does not reflect what Labor had in place in the 2017 bill, it goes some way to ensuring that the issue of non-attendance is addressed to the benefit of our students.

A lot more is included in this bill that other members have already spoken about today. I would like to conclude by saying that, having spoken with many teachers, the government wanting to remove the AEU nominee from the relevant committees—someone who is likely to be a teacher or former teacher and who has been recently trained in the merit selection policy and procedures—is really just the government adhering to their ideological opposition to unions and not in the best interest of our schools.

Mr BASHAM (Finniss) (12:43): I rise to speak in support of the Education and Children's Services Bill 2018. This is a long-overdue initiative to provide a modern, 21st century legislative framework for the delivery of education and children's services in our state, repealing and replacing acts that are decades old. I acknowledge the work of those opposite in the previous parliament to modernise our legislation in this space. An important difference in this updated version of the bill is the empowerment of school communities. This recognises that every school is different, with different needs and different priorities, and that local stakeholders, not centralised bureaucrats, are best placed to understand and prioritise those needs.

In debating this bill, it is important that we focus entirely on the delivery of public-funded education and children's services, so let those opposite take note that there is no virtue or inherent expertise in being a member of the Australian Education Union and, therefore, no reason for union input in education provision to be enshrined in legislation. The bill sensibly removes the AEU in this respect. Our children require nothing less than the best education and services that can be provided, be that from the public or private sector. Let's stay focused on the public sector in this debate.

The bill removes the central controls over school and preschool governing councils proposed in previous iterations of the bill by the former Labor government. The government believes that, by empowering school communities, we will deliver better student outcomes and have happier and more effective school communities. We have removed provisions for the minister to direct, suspend, dissolve and establish a new governing council under disciplinary circumstances. We have also introduced changes to ensure that parents or other persons responsible for children and students at schools, preschools and children's centres will form the majority of members of the governing councils of those schools and services.

The bill includes provisions for governing councils to access funds for independent legal advice when they are in dispute with the department. This was a specific recommendation of the Debelle royal commission. Under the bill, the Crown Solicitor, or a nominee of the Crown Solicitor, will make a decision as to whether a governing council's request meets the necessary requirements to be funded. The relevant funds will be administered by the Attorney-General's Department.

This empowerment of local school communities has particular relevance in regional areas such as Finniss. Schools in the electorate of Finniss provide very different learning options and environments. It was great to have the Minister for Education visit our region this month and for him to see it himself. We visited the Mount Compass Area School and we discussed its unique agricultural and environmental programs.

In these programs, we see students raise and prepare livestock for competition at the Royal Adelaide Show. They spend many months teaching animals to lead, feeding the animals and making sure they are in prime condition. They also learn where our food comes from because these animals are destined, in most cases, for the food chain. We see these animals raised and entered in the on-hooks competition. They are first judged alive and standing and then they are judged as carcasses. This is a great learning for the students of Mount Compass.

Mount Compass also works very closely with the dairy industry, placing children on dairy farms to understand how a dairy farm works and allowing them to have some greater understanding of the community in which they live. The students learn all about animal husbandry and land management, while also observing and learning about the environmental impacts of farming practices.

This is not just about the environment itself: it is also about the sustainability of agriculture operating in the environment. It is understanding that there is more to sustainability than just caring for the plants, the trees and the soil. It is also about caring for the people and the economic basis of the businesses that operate—without all those things, those businesses are not sustainable—so it makes sure that students understand all those necessary parts.

We also visited Port Elliot Primary School and saw some students with learning difficulties and the great work the staff at the school are doing in working with these students. They had some students who required at least one-on-one teachers—if not, in occasional cases, two-on-one teachers—to help them through the education system so they are able to learn. It is a very high demand and pressured environment for the staff involved and it is a wonderful thing they are doing there.

Many in the community continue to flock to the school for the way in which it is improving educational outputs of the school across the board, not just for those who are struggling with their learning disabilities. It is a very interesting school. Looking around, there are very few desks, and in some classrooms there are no desks—not even the teacher has a desk. It is a very different learning experience for some of those students in that school.

Regarding committee membership, this government believes the needs of schools, preschools or children's services are not necessarily served by having staff representation on decision-making groups only available to members of the Australian Education Union. The bill removes the exclusive right of the Australian Education Union to nominate members of the relevant committees formed under the bill, including selection committees for promotional level positions in the teaching service, reclassifications and review committees considering the amalgamation or closure of the school. The members of selection committees will now be appointed by the department's chief executive and at least one will be a person elected from the teaching service to represent them on such committees. For the purpose of amalgamations and closures of schools, review committees will include a staff member of each school to be nominated by their respective staff.

As to religious or cultural activities, let's be clear that it will still be okay for Christmas carols to be sung in public schools. It is so important that children can be children, enjoy the things we all enjoyed as children and partake in activities like singing Christmas carols and the joys around doing so. The so-called 'war on Christmas' is a fanciful invention and has no place in this debate. Schools and preschools may participate in religious or cultural activities, and this bill provides some clarity in this respect, especially that parents be properly notified in advance of such activities and be given the opportunity to exempt their child or children from them, rather than the other way around of having to give permission to attend.

The bill includes multiple measures supporting students' attendance and reducing chronic truancy, including penalties for parents of chronically absent students; however, the framework is to support students and their families, not to punish them. The bill provides for measures in this respect, including family conferencing. There are many causes of chronic truancy, and we must ensure that appropriate measures are taken to understand individual circumstances and develop strategies to address them. Everyone—students, families, schools and the community—benefits from children attending school at all times.

It is very sad to see children roaming the street on school days, avoiding going to school. It is something that is going to affect them for the rest of their lives, and it is going to affect the community in the future as well. Not having an education that is sufficient to partake in a community in a way in which you can be a part of that community and deliver for that community creates enormous pressures going forward.

We need to make sure that we do everything we can to encourage children to attend school and make schools places where children want to be. It is such an important part of life to get an education. Everyone—students, families, schools and the community—benefits from children attending school all the time. The Nyland royal commission identified truancy as a significant risk factor in child protection issues. In addition to these strengthened provisions, the government will audit attendance policies at all government schools and increase the number of truancy officers by 50 per cent.

As to safe learning and working environments, the government is supportive of strong measures to protect students, teachers and other staff acting in the course of their duties from offensive behaviour or abusive and threatening or insulting language. Included in this bill is the provision to suspend, exclude or expel a student from a school if a student has perpetrated violence, acted illegally or persistently interfered with the ability of a teacher to conduct their lessons.

Other measures aimed at promoting safe learning and working environments include providing powers for the chief executive to terminate the employment of an officer of the teaching service if the officer is not a registered teacher within the meaning of the Teachers Registration and Standards Act 2004 or if the officer is a prohibited person within the meaning of the Child Safety (Prohibited Persons) Act 2016.

The measures also include a provision for a person to be barred from a school, preschool or children's service if that person has behaved in an offensive manner while on the premises or threatened or insulted staff or committed or threatened to commit any other offences on or in relation to the premises. Other provisions deal with trespass on all schools, preschools and children services sites; strengthen provisions for authorised persons to deal with people behaving in an unacceptable manner on premises; mandate working with children checks for adults returning to study at schools; and prohibit the use of corporal punishment in all preschools and schools. That is certainly something that has changed from my schooling days.

An honourable member interjecting:

Mr BASHAM: I was a very good boy at school. No, I did not! Another measure provides a power for the chief executive to direct a child who may pose a risk to the health, safety or welfare of other students or staff to be enrolled at or attend a specific government school program, after taking reasonable steps to consult with their parent or caregiver.

In my concluding remarks, I want to again thank the minister for coming down to the Finniss electorate to visit the schools to see firsthand the issues that are facing the schools. Particularly of interest was going to the Mount Compass Area School, where the chairman of the school council made the comment that the funding towards the STEM project that is being implemented there at the moment was a bit like giving a child an Xbox when they did not own a television. So the basics of what was needed at the school were not up to scratch, but they were given the gold-plated part first.

We need to make sure that the community within that region has the ability to have some control. There are few responsibilities of government more important than education and child services and it is great to see the commitment of the Marshall Liberal government. I commend this bill to the house.

Debate adjourned on motion of Mr Cowdrey.

Sitting suspended from 12:59 to 14:00.

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