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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2022-06-15 Daily Xml
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Public School Fees

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER (Morialta) (14:20): Supplementary question: why does the minister say that it was necessary to get that information out quickly to families so they would know what to do when the letter itself says, 'You don't need to do anything yet or contact your school,' and it then goes on to explain that the school will be in touch with families to later tell them what to do?

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! Member for Unley! Member for Badcoe!

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The Premier is called to order. The member for Schubert is called to order. Member for Unley! The minister has the call.

The Hon. B.I. BOYER (Wright—Minister for Education, Training and Skills) (14:21): Well, that's a real gotcha moment. Obviously, it's because those opposite, when they were still in government, made a commitment to offer this $100 per child this financial year and the next and it was matched by the Malinauskas Labor government, the then Labor Malinauskas Labor opposition.

There was some public discussion, public dialogue, between public school families and the education department around how this would be happening and when it would be happening. We wanted to make sure it was clear to parents, who had already started asking questions straightaway about whether or not they needed to do anything to be able to claim the money and of course, where they had already paid school fees, which has happened in some cases, what action they could take to try to get reimbursed for the school fees they had already paid or whether they could work with their local school in any cases to have that $100 instead discounted off other things that the school might be running in that year—for instance, excursions or school camps.

It was very much about informing the public and making sure they knew what they did or didn't have to do in this case. I know that, as a former education minister himself, the member for Morialta would know that in such an enormous system, where we have in the whole public system 270-something thousand students and in the public system more than 170, there are obviously going to be lots of questions we are going to have to field from concerned parents who want to make sure they are eligible and, if they have already paid the school fees, what they can do to still take advantage of the $100. Making the most of this communication out to families about what the process was I think was the prudent thing to do.

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