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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2022-06-01 Daily Xml
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Grievance Debate

State Labor Government

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER (Morialta) (15:17): This week, there has been some information provided by the Minister for Education in question time and, indeed, by the Premier and the Minister for Education in the media, and others from the Labor Party in social media that strongly suggests that Labor is walking away from what was a clear commitment to the people of South Australia: to provide universal access for preschool for all three year olds in South Australia from 2026.

When pressed about this matter, I heard the Premier on TV this morning saying that the plan was that the process would be commencing from 2026. I note that the Minister for Education on Twitter early this morning said that Labor was the only party that went to the election with a plan to deliver three-year-old preschool. This commitment remains and we will deliver exactly what we promised South Australians. It will commence in 2026. It is the use of the word 'commence' that the government is using, that the minister and the Premier are using, to say that their program will commence from 2026, but what will commence?

The minister, when pressed on national radio, in what was considered by many to be an utter train wreck interview on the ABC with Stacey and Nikolai, was very clear. He said that their commitment was to have a royal commission to inform the government on how they might deliver three-year-old preschool commencing in 2026.

What does this version of commencing mean? Because, when people were going to the polling booths, I am pretty sure what they thought it meant. They saw the posters that said Labor's plan for education: three-year-old universal preschool. When they read the policy document that says, inconveniently for the Labor Party I would suggest—the autism policy document describes Labor's commitment to offer three-year-old preschool to all children in South Australia from 2026. I am pretty sure that anyone would think that meant that all children in South Australia will get access to preschool for their three year olds in 2026—in 2026.

The Labor Party was asked about this in question time yesterday. The Minister for Education talked about it being staged and that there were some children—and he said this in the media as well on the radio—who clearly might have significant benefit from that. And he is right. We identified that in our budget document last year. Our early education policy clearly identifies on page 23, for the casual reader, that we were going to review the policy settings for an additional year of preschool for developmentally delayed children.

Clearly, we have identified that there is a benefit of a second year for developmentally delayed children, as indeed there is a benefit of a second year of preschool for Aboriginal children and for children under guardianship. You know how our bona fides stack up when I say that the Liberal Party supports two years of preschool for Aboriginal children and children under guardianship? Because we delivered it. We delivered for every year of the four years of the Marshall Liberal government. In fact, it was not just a novelty of the Marshall government; the Weatherill government delivered it as well.

So it is now a nonsense when the Malinauskas Labor government suggested that they were going to start offering three-year-old preschool to some children being a delivery of their election commitment. It is clearly a nonsense because some three-year-old children have had this for years. No, what they promised was universal access to three-year-old preschool and they said in their policy document: Labor's commitment to offer three-year-old preschool to all children in South Australia from 2026 The Minister for Human Services helped the Minister for Education on the Twitter feed. She tweeted:

This is a well thought out sustainable plan, approached in a way that will build a sector for the future with seamless transition the way good reform is implemented. Great work @BBoyer MP.

That suggests clearly a seamless transition, a suggestion again that goes with the way the minister described it yesterday that it will be introduced in stages, that some children will get it in 2026, that when we get to the next election on the third Saturday of March 2026, not all children will have been given the opportunity to access three-year-old preschool that year.

We know it is an expensive policy to deliver in reality. This may well be the case to justify the royal commission (I do not want to prejudge what the royal commission will do) but even if the royal commission suggests that rather than continuing, as is currently the model, to have the overwhelming majority of preschool programs in public preschools and, as some have suggested, the best way to do it is to expand their offerings from government-provided services and government-funded services in long day care so you have the preschool program available for the three year olds in the long day-care service where they already are, that saves on the capital cost but it still costs $100 million a year.

If Labor are serious about delivering on their election commitment that the people of South Australia voted for, then we are going to see that $100 million a year starting in 2026 in tomorrow's budget. I suspect that we were not and what has happened is that Labor has betrayed the trust of the people of South Australia.

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