Thursday, 22 June 2023

Schools funding

Jess WILSON (Kew) (17:29): (249) My adjournment tonight is for the Minister for Education, and the action I am seeking is that this government deliver fair funding for school capital works for all students across Victoria, including those in my seat of Kew. This government claims to govern for all Victorians, but nothing could be further from the truth. Labor’s true colours are on full display when it comes to school funding in their budget. Labor has short-changed students in Liberal, Nationals and Greens electorates, and one can only imagine it is because their parents had the temerity to vote against Labor. Labor allocated $241 million for new capital works and schools in their own seats, but in Liberal and National seats schools only received a paltry $14 million. Labor holds 63 per cent of the seats in this chamber, but it allocated 93 per cent of new school capital funds to schools in those seats. The Liberal–National coalition hold 32 per cent of seats and have received a measly 6 per cent in funding for our schools.

This is deeply unfair and deeply divisive, just like their school tax on parents who choose to send their children to independent schools. In particular I draw the minister’s attention to the five schools I have previously mentioned in my adjournment matter for her. Unfortunately the minister’s previous response was not satisfactory for these schools – schools that desperately need capital works in my electorate. Ad hoc maintenance funding to ensure school facilities are simply workable and safe for students and staff is not sufficient. That is the basic responsibility of government. Minimal maintenance funding does not meet the needs of these schools nor deliver what students and families expect for their local state schools.

Once again I call on the minister to fund capital works at Kew East Primary School with $6.5 million to replace the outdated buildings and build eight new permanent classrooms, a staff room and an office area; $12.2 million for Canterbury Girls Secondary College to deliver a new master plan and build fit-for-purpose science and art facilities; and $6.1 million for Balwyn Primary School for an upgrade to reflect the increasingly significant numbers at that school and deliver new classrooms and much-needed toilet facilities, staff facilities and sick bay facilities. And once again I call on the government to ensure that surplus funds from the building of the recent STEM centre at Kew High School are reinvested in upgrading the teaching and learning spaces and not repurposed for maintenance works. And finally, I call on the government to commit to funding phase 2 and phase 3 works at Chatham Primary School.

It should not matter which postcode you live in or what school you go to, the government should make sure that irrespective of what electorate you live in your school has access to fair capital funding to make sure your school’s teaching and learning facilities are up to scratch. It is a deeply saddening indictment of this government that it continues to punish parents simply for living in a postcode that does not suit their electoral fortunes – for voting the wrong way according to Labor. I call on the government to immediately review the capital funding provided to schools in the budget and reallocate it fairly across all schools in all seats, including in the electorate of Kew.