Wednesday, 5 June 2019

 The SPEAKER (02:02): I have accepted a statement from the member for Carrum proposing the following matter of public importance for discussion:

That this house notes Labor’s strong investment and reform in Victoria’s education sector and further notes:

(1)   the Andrews Labor government’s 2019–20 budget provides $321.9 million for free dental care for students at all Victorian public primary and secondary schools;

(2)   the Andrews Labor government is delivering the biggest reform in the history of our state’s early childhood education with three-year-old kinder for every Victorian child; and

(3)   the Andrews Labor government’s 2019–20 budget invests $881.6 million to begin that rollout, giving children access to two years of subsidised kinder and ensuring our kids are ready for school and set for life.

 Ms KILKENNY (Carrum) (14:02): Speaker, thank you for giving the house this opportunity to speak on this very important matter. This matter of public importance (MPI) in my name is all about values and priorities, and it really is also about the contrast between this Labor government and governments of the National and Liberal parties. I think perhaps that nowhere else is the contrast more stark and more compelling than it is in the area of education and in the investments that we choose to make in our young people. Having just handed down our fifth budget, there would probably be very little doubt in the minds of most Victorians about what the priorities and values of this government are, and of course right up there is education. That is because it is Labor governments that invest in education and it is Labor governments that invest in our young people and in Victorian families, and that is because it is absolutely the right thing to do.

We saw the cuts the Liberal-Nationals made to education when they were given the opportunity to lead this great state. They only had one term, but those cuts hurt. Let us not forget that when we are talking about budgets, when we are talking about cuts, those are deliberate choices—those are choices that they made. They chose to cut school budgets, they chose to cut TAFEs, they chose to close TAFEs, they chose to scrap the education maintenance allowance, they chose not to build one new school in their term of government and they chose to let school buildings run right down into the ground. I have to say that they let down our youngest Victorians, they let down Victorian families and they certainly let down our teachers and educators. They made a conscious and very deliberate choice not to invest in education, and by making that choice they failed every single Victorian.

We will not do that. When it comes to education, we know that if we want to support this state to be the strongest and smartest state, if we want to grow our economy and create thousands of jobs and if we want to create opportunities and support Victorians to reach their full potential, we have to start with education. That is exactly what we are doing; we choose education, and I could not be prouder to be a part of the Andrews Labor government in our second term making absolutely historic investments in our education and now particularly in our education in the early childhood area.

As I said, budgets are about choices, and this government’s fifth budget continues that record investment. But of course we know that it actually goes a whole lot further than that. This budget, this historic budget for education, is setting the bar even higher. We have this new norm about the kind of investment we are seeing in education, and our investment in education this year goes further than any other government’s in this state’s history, and that is something we should all be very, very proud of on this side of the house.

As the MPI notes, the Andrews Labor government’s 2019–20 budget provides $321.9 million for free dental care for students at all Victorian primary and secondary schools. This is such smart policy, and in fact very soon we are going to start to see those beautiful orange dental vans—and I have to say, orange is my second-favourite colour—hitting Victorian schools, kicking off in Cranbourne, in Wodonga, in Box Hill and in Barwon South, and it will be scaled up until it is statewide in 2022. This really is smart investment, and it will see services delivered directly to schools, so directly to the students, and that means parents and families will not have to arrange appointments, they will not have to take time off work and, importantly, they will not be out of pocket. Obviously we want to make sure that we are driving down dental conditions, tooth decay, tooth disease. We want to make sure that fewer kids are ending up in hospital. We promised to bring back the dental vans for kids, and that is exactly what we are going to do.

But of course our investment in education does not end here. It was the Andrews Labor government in our last term that brought in the Camps, Sports and Excursions Fund to make sure that kids do not miss out. It was this Labor government that provided further support for State Schools Relief, and that is supporting families with the cost of uniforms and school books. It was the Andrews Labor government that introduced the Glasses for Kids program. It was the Andrews Labor government that introduced breakfast clubs in our last term, and I have to say that that is something I am particularly proud of. We knew that one in seven children were coming to school on an empty tummy, and that is just unacceptable. Those kids cannot learn on an empty tummy and they cannot concentrate. So we have now rolled out this program which has served more than 7 million breakfasts, which is absolutely extraordinary. We have now announced that we are going to extend that to a further 500 schools and we are going to ramp it up to include lunch also at participating schools.

We know that we have brought in the Doctors in Secondary Schools program and soon, in what I think is a really important initiative, we are going to have qualified mental health practitioners on campus. We have introduced Respectful Relationships into the school curriculum. It was the Royal Commission into Family Violence that described Respectful Relationships in our schools as an investment in future generations, and it certainly is that.

We have introduced funding, in an absolute Australian first, to make sure that girls at government schools will have access to free tampons and pads, and of course we are continuing to roll out our school building boom, with this year’s budget containing a further $1.82 billion for new schools and school upgrades.

These are our priorities. These are our Labor values. But of course there is another one which is very close to my heart, and this is the Andrews Labor government delivering the biggest reform ever in the history of this state to early childhood education with three-year-old subsidised kinder across Victoria. Even when I say that I get goosebumps, when I think about the opportunity, about the potential, about the possibilities. We all know it. In fact I was at a budget briefing for business last week and the Premier was up there talking about the budget and listing some of the highlights from this year’s budget. When he got to three-year-old kinder the entire crowd just erupted into spontaneous applause—and that is because everyone gets it. They feel it. This is about equity, this is about access and it is about opportunity for all.

Just as we promised to the people of Victoria before the 2018 state election, we are going to deliver on our commitment to roll out kinder for every three-year-old Victorian. This will mean adding an extra year of play-based learning before school, and it is learning that will be led by a qualified teacher. I have to say that Victoria will become, very proudly I think, the envy of the nation. We will be the first state or territory to introduce a subsidised program for all three-year-olds. As I said, last week the Andrews Labor government handed down its budget for 2019–20. This budget includes a massive $881.6 million to begin this historic rollout. A big chunk of that, $473.2 million, will be for early childhood infrastructure alone. That is so crucial because we are going to need to work really closely and collaboratively with the sector to build nearly 1000 new and upgraded kinder facilities to meet the expected increase in demand for kinder places.

This year’s budget also includes $92.4 million for an additional workforce that we are going to need—that is, more teachers and educators. In fact we are looking at about 6000 in total, so it is 4000 teachers and 2000 educators in addition to what we have now. To encourage and support that workforce we will be promoting scholarships, professional development and training, mentoring programs and incentives. I really encourage all members in this place to get out there and to promote the opportunities that are available for school leavers and for people wanting to return to work, or to upskill, to think about early childhood education as a fantastic career. As part of this growth, $28.5 million in this year’s budget alone will go towards free TAFE for two early childhood qualifications starting next year—the diploma of early childhood education and care, and certificate III in early childhood education and care.

A further $26.1 million will go towards extending our school readiness funding. This funding is an Australian first and again something we should be very proud of. This is needs-based funding for kindergarten and it is funding that will directly support children to get the very most out of their kindergarten experience. It is tremendous. I have seen it already operating in practice with kinders using it for things as varied as occupational speech pathologists, professional development and cultural inclusiveness; there are so many things that this can be used for to just enhance the kinder experience and to make it a more inclusive, welcoming and, importantly, valuable place for our kids.

We are going to work very hard to boost even further our already high rates of kinder participation in Victoria. Again, we want to make sure that all children can access the full benefits of two years of quality play-based learning before school. As I said, this is about equality, it is about opportunity and of course it is also about access. At the moment three-year-old kinder costs roughly $5000 a year. That cost is out of reach for so many Victorians, so subsidised kinder will see about a quarter of Victorian families paying nothing at all for three-year-old kinder, with subsidies available for many, many other families.

Now, this is a long-term commitment. It is about setting up kids for life. Whatever their background, wherever they live, this is about giving our kids the best start in life. And we know that 90 per cent of a child’s brain development occurs before they turn five, so the research tells us and the experts tell us that adding an extra year of learning is crucial and it can make the biggest difference to a child’s educational outcomes. I think we all agree that if we can do that in this place we have achieved an awful lot for the future of this state. So there really is no smarter investment than this, and I think most of Victoria agrees with that.

So you certainly would expect then that the federal government would perhaps support us in this, but unfortunately that is not the case. In fact the federal coalition government, to my knowledge, has not even mentioned three-year-old kinder—not once. But it actually gets worse than that. We know that the federal Liberal-National government is putting four-year-old kinder at risk too.

Do you know what? I feel like it is deja vu. Every year I stand up in this place and I talk about the National Partnership Agreement on Universal Access to Early Childhood Education, and that is the agreement under which the Andrews Labor government—the state government—provides 10 hours of funding and the federal government puts in 5 hours. Every year the federal Liberal government just puts in that one additional year—they refuse to commit to long-term funding—but this year it is even worse. We know that they have refused to commit beyond the 2020 calendar year for four-year-old kinder funding. I will repeat it: they have refused to commit beyond 2020. That is an absolute deliberate choice to cut funding to four-year-old kinder.

I implore those opposite, in particular the Deputy Leader of the Opposition in her role as shadow Minister for Education, to stand up for our littlest Victorians. Stand up for them. Support this, and get your colleagues in Canberra to support this, to support our littlest Victorians, to support Victorian families, to support our educators and to support our teachers. This is about the future of Victoria. The evidence is unequivocal. Governments must prioritise long-term investment in education and early childhood education. We need to make sure that every child in this state is given the best start in life. That starts with early childhood education, and that is exactly what the Andrews Labor government is choosing to provide.

 Ms McLEISH (Eildon) (14:17): I am now going to paint perhaps a little bit of a different picture to the glowing references that the lead speaker did with her matter of public importance (MPI), because there are a number of areas where the government has really failed in this sector and we have seen a lot of game playing. We saw this mostly prior to the federal election and in fact even into last year, well prior to the federal election, when the government were relying on the wider community of Australia to throw out the coalition government at the federal level. That just did not happen. Wasn’t it a glorious time, that Saturday night and Sunday, when we saw that the Liberal government was going to be returned? The games that the Labor government in Victoria had played had all come back to bite them, because they were the only state government who refused to sign up to the federal funding that was being offered.

A member interjected.

Ms McLEISH: It was not being underfunded or ripped off. All other states seem to have actually eventually joined up, realising that this was very important. So we had the Premier and the Minister for Education play hardball, so they thought, to sign up, because they thought they were going to get a better deal from Bill Shorten. Now, we all know what has happened to Bill Shorten, and we know also that they wasted millions of taxpayer dollars on dodgy advertising campaigns in a failed attempt to put Bill Shorten in the lodge. All that time the Premier and the minister should have sat down with the commonwealth and provided funding certainty for the schools, and this funding certainty is all the more important because after that war on Scott Morrison by the Premier and the minister we found that independent schools in particular face the prospect of having to take out bank loans to cover a shortfall.

Now, what does this actually mean? There are two tranches of payment, one in January and one in July, and after the state election the Premier and the Minister for Education thought that they would play hardball and not sign up to this. A number of independent schools were quite alarmed at the gap that this might mean for them. We saw what happened—an interim agreement was entered into which allowed the payment in January to actually be made, but there were a number of schools who had newer campuses in growth suburbs, such as in Wyndham and Bacchus Marsh, who came on after this, and they were faced with the very real prospect of not actually having any money. I know that those opposite, whilst many of them have been to private schools and sent their children to private schools, really do not like the independent schools. But let me say: there are some 220 independent schools in Victoria, and most of them are at the very, very low-fee-paying end. Now, those opposite would typically think they are all the big $30 000-a-years, but that is not the case. The median fee for these 220 schools is about $5000. Many are way less than that if that is the median. But anyway, we saw that these schools were quite agitated. We also know that the federal government pay the lion’s share of the funding for the independent schools.

I want to now mention the government advertising, because the government talks about investing and reforming the education sector, but what was it investing in? We had a shameless program of advertising, where precious taxpayer dollars were wasted on what was blatant political advertising, and this was actually revealed in the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee (PAEC) last week: it was not just a $1 million program, as when you looked at the tenders for advertising, it actually ended up being $1.2 million, plus another $500 000 in the creative. So that is people who sit around to come up with the ideas about how they can do this dodgy deal and spend $1.7 million. We saw this, as I said, in PAEC. I think the minister really needs to come clean and say exactly what this is costing.

I recall being at the MCG where I saw the banners going around the MCG on Fair Share funding. I thought, ‘You’ve got to be kidding’. In fact it was pointed out to the person sitting next to me that these were taxpayer funded. Spending taxpayers money on political campaigning is straight out of Labor’s red shirts playbook. While we had children over summer sweltering in classrooms with no air conditioning—and there are a number of those; I visited some—this government thought it would be fine to go ahead and waste taxpayers money on political propaganda attacking the federal government. If they wanted to attack the Morrison government, they should have spent Labor’s money doing this, not taxpayers money. As a result, this has been referred to IBAC.

A member interjected.

Ms McLEISH: I would not be so mouthy if I were the member, because IBAC is a fairly significant deal. We look forward to what is going to happen with that.

I want to now just touch on the asbestos program in schools.

A member: The abandoned asbestos in schools.

Ms McLEISH: The abandoned asbestos program. Hasn’t that turned out to be a bit of an issue? The government announced in 2014 that all schools would be asbestos free by 2020. Now, that time frame has been pushed out in the budget; that is a commitment that the government has failed to meet. This is really indicative of Labor: a government that always manages projects over time and over budget. If we watched the nightly news, we would see that the parents at Essendon North Primary School were horrified to not just hear about but witness this deadly asbestos dust covering desks, bags and the floor at the school. Parents were alarmed to see this because we know there is no safe level of exposure to asbestos and even a limited exposure can prove to have serious health impacts. One of the parents was actually asked, ‘Can you whip in there and clean it up?’. She actually asked the question, ‘What am I cleaning up?’. It was later revealed that this was asbestos, so the government have put a number of students and families in some danger, and they are not at all happy about this.

We could have had some greater funding here. One example is Seaspray Primary School in Chilwell, Geelong, where there has been a real battle to get funding to try and rectify some of their issues. We have also heard of instances where schools have been given much-wanted capital funding that they thought they were going to do some significant renovations with, build a hall perhaps, and they have found out now that that capital funding is to be used as part of the asbestos removal program. They feel absolutely dudded on this—completely dudded.

In 2014 the Premier promised:

Under Labor, the asbestos will be gone, the risks will be removed and the portables will be replaced, because our kids health and safety means everything.

Well, there is a still a fair bit of work to do here. He went on to say:

Classrooms have to be the safest places in the world for our kids, because they spend half their young lives inside of them.

This government is all talk when it comes to removing asbestos, but when it comes time to deliver, they fail in this area.

Labor’s mismanagement is not just in the maintenance of these school buildings. We can see how it delivers services that affect the quality of teaching and training and the quality of education that students are receiving. This is not me talking, this is the Victorian Auditor-General’s Office which released a report earlier this year entitled Professional Learning for School Teachers. The report looked into the effectiveness of ongoing training for teachers as a way of supporting better student outcomes. The report found that after four years under an Andrews Labor government the Department of Education and Training had a complete lack of oversight of the way teachers develop and maintain their skills. The report also found that the government has no thorough understanding of how $107 million had been run up by schools sending their staff to conferences and seminars. I do note that in the budget questionnaire the government has identified savings, albeit cuts, in this area of teacher training. This means teachers might be undertaking professional training that has no benefit to them and will not have any impact on student outcomes such as literacy and numeracy. We know that that is particularly important.

I want to touch now on early learning and three-year-old programs. The benefits of early learning have been well documented. Young brains are agile, and this is the time when children do the majority of their learning and development; this is true of their physical, mental, emotional and social development. Children have a natural curiosity and they need to be provided with an environment where that curiosity can develop, where their brains can grow and where they can thrive and flourish. They need a safe environment in which to do so, and that safe environment includes the home, it includes making sure that they have adequate nutrition and it also includes having opportunities in areas where they are free from abuse and neglect, and can work on this. We know that this is extremely important.

We also know that too many children are not receiving any reading. There was something in my electorate a while ago about the number of people who read to their children, which is something that we think people do as a matter of course. We know that many families do not read to their children, and this is in the very early years. This needs to be encouraged. Children will learn by hearing, looking at pages in books and looking at words. We also know that phonics is an extremely effective way of teaching children to read. I would like to point out to the house that while the world is moving forward in this area Victoria has not really been ready to grasp phonics. I think it is changing a little bit, but we know that this is a great way to help kids get on board early and to make sure that if kids are falling behind they can have the appropriate attention they need. We went to the election looking at phonics screening at year 1 so that kids do not get left behind and in year 6 find that they cannot read and write. We also know that kids with dyslexia benefit greatly from phonics training.

I notice that the government, with the rollout of three-year-old kinder, is first of all looking to do this in country Victoria in six local government areas (LGAs). Other than South Gippsland, many of them are actually very small municipalities with a handful of kindergartens each. I have noticed that accompanying this is a strategy that the government is putting in place to look at scholarships to get some additional training for teachers but also $9000 as an incentive to try to get people to move to country Victoria.

I was on the autism inquiry, and one of the things that we found was that there is a huge shortage of these sorts of skills in country areas, not just teaching skills at that early level but speech pathologists, physiotherapists and occupational therapists. It was put to us time and time again that one of the best ways to develop a rural workforce is to train them in rural Victoria. We see time and time again that what happens is people move up there, they have got an incentive—it might be for two years—and then they move back. We have seen this with doctors. We have seen in a number of areas that people will go for the duration of that program or what is required of them. It is very important that what we do is make sure that those positions last, that people want to live in rural Victoria and that they want to move to rural Victoria, knowing that there are some great jobs. But this is likely to happen and these jobs are likely to be filled if they do their training there in the first place.

I would strongly encourage the government to make sure that there are training opportunities, because we see that country brain drain where people will move from the country to undertake training—whether it is tertiary training or maybe TAFE training—in the city, and often they do not go back. We need people certainly to head out into the country, because we know that not only are the first six LGAs coming on, which are in some of the more remote areas—Buloke, Hindmarsh, North Grampians, Strathbogie, Yarriambiack and South Gippsland, which perhaps is not as remote—but the second tranche is coming on by 2021, with another 15 LGAs also in country Victoria.

The strategy needs to be in place so that those people are not just on the ground for year 1 of that program but are also there for year 5 and year 10, because in all likelihood—not always, but in all likelihood—for people that move to the country the stats are against them staying there on a permanent basis.

I am also concerned that we are 1000 classrooms short and they need to be built. I would hope very much that these are not built on outdoor space and that we lose the outdoors environment, because we know that children spend way too much time indoors and too much time in front of screens, even at a very young age. So I would hate to see some of these buildings actually encroach on that outdoor space.

I see that in my electorate, and particularly in the Murrindindi shire, they are expanding the outdoor space by offering bush kinder. Marysville has a very strong bush kinder program. Alexandra has a great bush kinder program, as does the Kinglake Ranges. The kids love it. They get out, they get dirty, they get wet and they go home very, very messy, but it gets them out into the great outdoors. The physical and emotional skills that they develop from being outdoors cannot be underestimated. So I think the government has some work to do to make sure that some of their policies actually stick.

 Mr CARBINES (Ivanhoe) (14:33): Well, that is unfortunate. I just wanted to in particular on the matter of public importance spend some time discussing the Andrews Labor government’s 2019–20 budget that provides $321.9 million for free dental care for students at all Victorian public primary and secondary schools. What a great initiative and one that of course touches directly on what families understand is a very significant cost to them, not only financially but there is the cost that comes from poor oral hygiene and poor oral health. A lot of that is driven in communities where perhaps diet and other pressures lead to poor dental health outcomes.

I will set the scene for why the Andrews government has had to step up to support families. In some cases with the family budget in making some hard decisions people put off their oral health. Of course the Australian Dental Association, in touching on the federal coalition’s budget last year in relation to public dental services, said, and I quote:

In a pre-budget announcement, the Government indicated that the federal contribution to public dental health services would be cut by around $45 million per annum, a disappointment development that will further impact the oral health of the most disadvantaged Australians.

That is $45 million per annum cut from public dental services by the federal coalition government. What does that mean on the ground for families, particularly in vulnerable communities?

In particular I would like to draw attention to Banyule Community Health Service and, Speaker, you will be familiar with the campus in your electorate. It is in both West Heidelberg in my electorate and also in Greensborough. I just want to draw on their Quality Account community care report from 2018, where they outline their Smiles 4 Miles early childhood service—a service that I think should be highlighted in this house, and I quote:

Eleven early childhood services in Banyule took part in the Smiles 4 Miles program provided by—

Banyule Community Health service and DHSV—

(Dental Health Services Victoria). A total of 629 children took part in the program—

generating 124 referrals. Of those:

One hundred children from six pre-schools had an Oral Health check and 27 had evidence of decay or other anomaly. One service brought 19 students on an excursion to the clinic, where they met a dental nurse, had a ride in the dental chair and received a take home information pack.

What this all comes down to is explaining that in our communities some 10 primary schools took part in the program, nearly 700 children had an oral health check and 21 per cent had signs of decay or other anomalies. This is very significant, because if we do not pick up on these issues at an early age, this is something that comes back to—pardon the pun—bite these people in the longer term. These are really serious issues. If we do not get to them early and if we do not ensure that people take some responsibility as well and understand their oral health, then these problems progress into the future.

Something like 1700 children received classroom-based education on oral health and diet advice. Students are providing more services. Where students were on average two to three clients a day, they are now averaging four to six clients a day. This relates, of course, to the clinic at Banyule Community Health service and trying to meet a growing demand. Success was evident in the reduction of formal client complaints, and also the time of emergency appointments was extended to provide enough time for treatment to be completed.

I just wanted to touch on the work of the places that are closest to communities, particularly vulnerable communities—these community health services. The work that they are doing to nip problems in the bud and provide a platform for families and for young people in particular to understand their oral health at an early age is critical. That is why we then need to provide greater support in our community for families to understand that the Andrews government understands their need around oral health services and also understands that there is significant cost, particularly when you come across problems and oral health issues. How can we deal with some of those?

Of course just this year we are following up on a very significant election commitment that we made and which was affirmed at the ballot box in overwhelming numbers by the Victorian community. Those smile squads—Dan’s vans—the three dental vans will hit schools soon. I would like to just pick up on some comments that the Premier made in relation to these matters when he said that:

We’re making sure school students have a bright and healthy smile and we’re helping hard-working families save on costly dental bills, as we promised we would.

Kids’ oral health is so important, but busy families can often struggle to find the time to get to the dentist. We’re fixing that.

The Minister for Health in the other place added her contribution on these matters when she stated in developing this policy that:

Our kids deserve the best start in life, and good oral health is important to lay the foundations for good lifelong health and wellbeing.

Tooth decay is preventable, but we all know dental bills hit the hip pocket hard. That’s why our free dental care in public schools program is so important.

Can I say that I am old enough to remember the dental health vans at my old school, Bell Primary School in West Preston. I was fortunate that we were taken to the dentist, but the school dental service was effectively the only dental health services that many families growing up in West Preston, at my school, had an opportunity to interact with. It is really critical, I think, to give an understanding to people about how we can provide assistance to them but also so they can develop that understanding in their own lives about how they can manage their oral health, how these discussions then lead to discussions about their diet and how they lead to discussions about what can happen if you do not deal with these issues from an early age.

We have seen that in communities where we have people visiting the public dental health services at Banyule Community Health, more senior people in our community, who when we talk about trying to get a job, when we talk about their sense of self-worth and their own confidence—being able to have a positive outlook at a job interview, being able to smile, being able to show off your pearly whites in whatever state they might be—these are critical issues that people have a great lack of confidence around in terms of getting a job and in being able to contribute to the community. It is because they have had a setback or are held back in relation to their dental health.

These are lifelong issues for people. It always goes to the heart of the Premier’s work, going back to his roles as Minister for Health and parliamentary secretary for health. Prevention and health prevention were key issues in a policy sense—trying to get to these issues early and not trying to deal with them when it is too late. There are certainly generations in our community who we are providing that support to at perhaps a time when we could not get to it earlier. So it is critical.

Another aspect, not to divert too much, is around fluoridation of water supplies and the work that the government has done over both the Bracks-Brumby government and our government to ensure across regional Victoria that water supplies and the opportunity to invest in fluoridated water supplies has seen the oral health of people in regional communities get the same opportunity in comparison to children in other places. I know my siblings who grew up in Geelong, where water was not fluoridated, have had different dental health issues to other members of my family. Very significant changes were done through the Bracks-Brumby government on those matters.

Can I say also that we opened Dental Health Service Victoria hospital, a new dental hospital in the Bracks government days, under Minister Pike. It was a very significant investment in our health services, and we also provided the TAFE and training opportunities across regional Victoria so that our dental health technicians, our dental health nurses and those who seek to do dentistry work can get the training that they need, develop their skills and provide opportunities to serve the community where they live.

There is some very significant work that the government is doing in relation to those dental health services, and I would say that it goes a long way to addressing the stresses and pressures on family budgets. When you are crook people get to the doctor and they use the Medicare services, but time and time again, until it is too late, many people put off being able to visit a dentist. And it is not because of a lack of care for their children or a lack of care for their family, it is driven financially—as a cost.

We need to understand that, and I think our government is attuned to those issues. It made sense. It was one of the issues that people talked about at the polling booths. It was an issue that people understood clearly, and I think it is vitally important that our government continues to understand and affirm that we know what the pressures are that families are under and that we know where we can make a difference. This is a lifelong investment, and it is shameful that those in Canberra seek to take away funds—$45 million per annum—from public dental health services when it is those people at the margins who have been cruelled at an early age by those in Canberra. I think the opportunities of the work we are doing here in delivering on Dan’s vans for our school dental services are going to provide a great future for young people and their families.

 Mr ROWSWELL (Sandringham) (14:43): It is wonderful to rise in the chamber this afternoon to speak on this matter of public importance (MPI), and I do so acknowledging the presence in the gallery this afternoon of some young people, some young students. I am not entirely sure which school you are from or what electorate you are from, but you are very welcome amongst us because what we are doing today is we are talking about early childhood education and we are talking about the importance of education within the state of Victoria. You young people—through you, Speaker—who are gathered in this chamber today are at the heart of what we are talking about, so you are very welcome amongst us. As I said in my maiden speech in this place in December last year, young people in Victoria are not just the leaders of the future but the leaders that we need today, so my message to every one of those young students gathered in the chamber today is to say to you that for all those times that you have been referred to as the leaders of the future, please ignore that—your politicians need you to be the young leaders of our community today. That is our challenge to you, and thank you so much for visiting the Parliament of Victoria.

On this matter of public importance I wanted to firstly acknowledge a personal interest in this particular matter. I am the father of a 20-month-old daughter, Abigail, so the matter that we are discussing today, this matter of public importance that refers to early childhood education, is of significant importance to my wife and me. It is a matter that is important to us. What is clear—and many people have said this and much research is around this—is that the importance of the early years are now well-known throughout Australia and the rest of the world. These years are a time when the brain develops and much of its wiring is laid down. The experiences and relationships a child has, plus their nutrition and health, can actually affect this enormously, and positive experiences help the brain to develop in healthy ways.

I had the great pleasure of attending recently on behalf of the shadow Minister for Education the ELAA—Early Learning Association Australia—conference. Now ELAA, for those in the chamber who do not know, is the peak body which works in partnership with early learning providers and parents to deliver excellence for providers and parents for early learning for every child. They have a diverse membership of 1100 or so service providers, including early years management organisations, kindergartens, local governments, day care services, government and independent schools and out-of-school-hours care programs. It was a fascinating conference. I was there with the Minister for Education and his parliamentary secretary, and for part of my research for this MPI I went through some of their budget submissions. For the last three years ELAA have submitted in their budget submission a number of items that they think are critically important. One of those critically important things is in their view a skilled, supported and valued workforce. They said, and I quote, that they would like to:

Improve attraction, recruitment and retention of high quality staff in a rapidly growing sector that is of increasing strategic importance to Government, families and the community.

They went on and they said that they would like to:

develop and implement a workforce strategy:

plan the growth of the teacher and educator workforce over the next decade

value and support educational leadership and build the capacity for instructional support

fund early years management services to mentor provisionally registered teachers to support them to become fully-registered

fund professional development, ensuring a cost-effective focus on quality improvement and capability development

measure implementation and use iterative and creative problem solving to better attract and retain staff.

So they asked for that in their 2019–20 budget submission. In their 2018–19 budget submission they asked for the same thing. They said:

Central to the quality provision of early childhood education is a skilled, supported and valued workforce. A multi-pronged workforce development strategy would sustainably raise standards and enhance the sector’s professional culture to deliver improved educational outcomes for children …

And again in 2017–18 in their budget submission to this government they asked for exactly the same thing:

Highly-skilled, collaborative workforce.

ELAA said here, and I quote from their budget submission:

The quality of the early learning workforce is pivotal to the richness of the learning experiences of children and their long-term outcomes. Supporting practitioners to grow and develop professionally will enable children’s needs to be met and better position the sector to meet future demands.

I could go on and quote other ELAA documents where they ask for the development of a workforce strategy. I will not, because the point that I simply wish to make is that the government may have delivered outcomes in this budget for this sector. However, they have not delivered upon the foundation for the expansion of this particular workforce, and that is the development of a workforce strategy. This is the peak body who is asking them to develop this workforce strategy so that the people who are charged with the education of young people are best skilled and best placed to educate young people, and that has simply not been delivered upon.

In the government’s announcement ‘Kindergarten for all three-year-old children’ they identify—and I am referring here to the education.vic.gov.au website—a rollout schedule. They say that in 2020 three-year-olds in six council areas will be able to access up to 15 hours of kindergarten. Now, in the time that I have had to prepare for this MPI contribution I have done a bit of research. I have done a bit of research on these six local government areas (LGAs): Buloke, Hindmarsh, North Grampians, South Gippsland, Strathbogie and Yarriambiack. And I went to the most recent census data available, 2016, and I did some fairly basic research and I pulled up how many three-year-olds actually exist within these local government areas when the latest census data, authoritative data, was available. And I came up with a number of 705. So across these six LGAs where this program will be rolled out there are in fact 705 three-year-olds living within these LGA areas. I then did a little bit of further research, and I went to how many three-year-olds there are in the state of Victoria. And I pulled up the figure, courtesy of the Australian Bureau of Statistics and the 2016 census data. And the total number of three-year-olds in Victoria is 76 016. Wow!

So if you would believe the government’s posturing on this particular announcement, you would think that three-year-old kinder is being rolled out across the state tomorrow. But no, the reality is quite different. It has been rolled out in six local government areas, totalling 705 three-year-olds out of 76 016 three-year-olds in the state of Victoria. It is okay, member for Mordialloc, I will do the maths for you—no need for a calculator, my friend. It is 0.93 per cent of the three-year-old population of Victoria. That is where it is being rolled out to. Less than 1 per cent of the three-year-old population of the Victoria is where this government’s policy is being rolled out to in the first place. If you believe the government’s posturing on this particular matter, you would think that it was being rolled out statewide tomorrow.

In the 90 seconds that I have left, and I really do not like the clock because I am just getting warmed up, I did a little bit of additional research. I did a 10-year comparison. The 10-year comparison looked at the amount of funding that has been placed for Victorian schools, both now and 10 years ago, and the research that I found—and I commend the Parliamentary Library for their assistance in this research as well—indicated to me that there has been a 200 per cent increase in output initiatives in the Victorian budget for the education sector in the last 10 years. Then you compare that to the outcomes that have been achieved in that time. In reading, year 9 has dropped from 94.7 per cent to 94.1 per cent. In year 7, reading has dropped from 95.8 to 95.1 per cent. In numeracy, year 7has dropped from 96.5 to 95.9 per cent. In year 3, numeracy has dropped from 96.5 to 96.3 per cent. So for at least the last decade, at best, standards and outcomes in our schools have flatlined, whereas the funding infrastructure has increased by 200 per cent. This just simply does not add up, and Victoria’s children deserve better.

 Mr RICHARDSON (Mordialloc) (14:53): It is a pleasure to rise and speak on this very important matter of public importance (MPI) and, as the Parliamentary Secretary for Schools and a member of the Andrews Labor government, it is a great time to be in the state of Victoria when we are investing in education. When you put forward the notion of an Education State you are setting a high bar for your community, you are setting a high bar for our state, but we want to be known for transforming the lives of each and every child—and student—in our state to make sure they have every opportunity in life.

But we have had a late conversion. We have had the member for Sandringham finally get on board. He has got on board with early education, early childhood. It is a pity he did not read the budget papers, where $5 billion has been invested in early childhood education. It is a pity he did not read the budget papers, where free TAFE has been rolled out to two early childhood education certifications. That is happening in our state. You have got to read the budget papers, and you have got to catch up.

The member for Eildon, in an extraordinary contribution, was talking about asbestos removal in our schools. Remember what the coalition did? They got a blue sticker, they got a yellow sticker and they went nuts. They went to every school with a bit of asbestos and slapped it straight on the window and said that was it. That was it. Well, we have got a record program of removing asbestos and making our schools safe from asbestos in Victoria. That is putting your money where your mouth is, because when you front up each year to do a budget it is about values. It is about what you stand for in your state and what you prioritise.

And let me take those opposite through some of these numbers, because they are worthy of looking through. The member for Sandringham said that standards over the last 10 years had been slipping in our state. Well, what happened during the first four years of that 10 years? What happened? We had unprecedented cuts to education, presided over by the Baillieu and Napthine governments. A combination of taking money out of schools, ripping the heart and soul out of schools, taking away the education maintenance allowance and punishing those that rely on that support so greatly will lead to worse outcomes.

But when the Premier, the Deputy Premier and the Minister for Education fronted up and Labor’s platform was put forward in 2014, we set ambitious targets. We set goals to change the landscape of education, not in a term of Parliament but for a generation. And by setting high standards and high targets that we were accountable to, in 2020 and 2025, we wanted to make sure that your postcode was not a determinant for your success, that your circumstances in growing up did not mean a second-rate education. Those were the values that we put forward. So the member for Sandringham can talk down our teachers and talk down our schools and early childhood educators, but right now we are investing in our schools and investing in our kinders, and we are transforming our state for the better. I am happy to say that with NAPLAN we have seen some of the best results ever in the state of Victoria.

Mr Battin: Speaker, I bring your attention to the state of the house.

Quorum formed.

Mr RICHARDSON: They get a bit touchy. They get a bit tetchy about talking about education in our state, because their record is an absolute shambles. But one of the most extraordinary things that we had was the shadow Minister for Education, at a time when we are on the cusp of signing the bilateral agreement, come in and champion a poor deal for Victoria. We had the guts to stand up. It should have been a unity ticket. It should have been the Minister for Education and the shadow Minister for Education standing there in a joint doorstop saying, ‘We’re not going to cop a poor deal for Victorians’. But what did we have today? We had the shadow Minister for Education championing that deal; a deal that puts Victorians second and Liberals first.

In that context as well, around early years, when we think about four-year-old kinder, we think of the raw deal that has been done year in, year out, and the fact that the federal Morrison coalition government has not committed to any funding beyond 2021. You see, this is about values. Ninety per cent of a child’s brain development happens in the first five years, and we know that the most transformational work that you can do is in the early years and transition into primary. That is changing.

When we think of intergenerational poverty and how we can enable students to be their very best and change the outcomes for all kids in our state, there is nothing more important than the best quality education. And whether it is the high achievers in excellence or whether it is those kids who need additional support with inclusive education in our kinders and our primary schools, our secondary schools and our specialist schools, that is how you change the outcomes, and that is how you do the best work you possibly can.

There is a lot of politics and conjecture in here on this MPI, but I would have thought that with a new beginning after the 58th Parliament we could have come forward and been on a unity ticket. Because when we talk about a fair share for Victoria, that campaign is still running now. It goes to the heart of where Victoria’s investment is and how we deserve better in meeting those requirements.

I heard the shadow Minister for Education talking about independent and Catholic schools. I know there is an issue with adding and subtracting and there was a bit of a blunder. ‘It’s his first time as shadow Minister for Education. We’ll let that slide—plus or minus’. Maybe with the NAPLAN results that the member for Sandringham referred to, maybe shadow cabinet could have a little crack at some of those questions—give it a bit of a crack. But those particular outcomes are so very important. When we look at those results and how important it is to set those milestones and those audits, that is what we are doing in our targets that we are setting and putting forward.

The biggest capital agenda in early education in our state’s history is being undertaken. Over 1000 new and expanded kindergarten facilities, some that were delivered in the last term of Parliament, are greatly benefiting my community and transforming those outcomes for our students. But really critically, the workforce will expand. The Productivity Commission back in 2015 acknowledged the shortfall in early childhood educators as we expand this particular area. Well, our values in the Education State and the Andrews Labor government are putting free TAFE forward, with thousands of people not having a barrier to the cost of obtaining a TAFE qualification and going forward and getting a job. One of the best contributions you can make in our state is to educate our next generation. Our teachers, our early childhood educators, do an incredible job in this space, and I want to put on the record how thankful we are for the work and service they do.

If you are a young person coming out of high school, if you have done the Victorian certificate of applied learning (VCAL), VET or VCE, you can get a job educating and supporting the next generation and lifting the outcomes for our kids in kinders across our state, with the rollout of universal subsidised kinder. It is also reducing the cost, the barrier, for so many families. We know that landmark report in the United Kingdom did not make a differentiation between three-year-old and four-year-old kinder, and it was only the Andrews Labor government, the Labor Party, who fronted up to the 2018 campaign and committed to fund three-year-old kinder. They are very, very silent on that side about this space. We hear criticisms from those opposite about where it has been rolled out. Well, under them there was no rollout. That was no universal three-year-old kinder. There was no policy commitment in this space. They were, once again, looking after their mates in Canberra—and it is Liberals first and Victorians second, because this is the greatest outcome.

Now, they can champion the federal election result, but if you really drill down into that, and that is the partisanship of this, it was a 52-48 result in Victoria, so I would not be crowing too much. The Leader of the Opposition has a go at it, but why don’t you see them front up on a unity ticket to ask the Prime Minister, Scott Morrison, to commit to four-year-old kinder and properly fund four-year-old and to properly commit to the student resource package and not get a second-rate deal for Victorian government schools? Let us see them put their money where their mouths are. Let us see true bipartisanship and support for our education system, because this is what the Education State is all about—it is about generations. It is not about the four-year term or the eight-year term; it is about transforming lives over the coming years, and we know disadvantaged pockets of our communities are most supported by that intervention in early years education.

This is what we do. This is what Labor does. It invests in our schools, in our early childhood education system and our TAFEs to transform our state for the better. We have got the best NAPLAN results in the state right now that we have ever seen, and we will keep going on and on in delivering the Education State.

 Ms KEALY (Lowan) (15:03): It is fantastic to be able to make a contribution to today’s matter of public importance regarding investment in the education sector. I feel like there has been some duplicitous—

A member interjected.

Ms KEALY: It is a quick speech from me only because there are so few schools in the Lowan electorate that have been addressed in this budget. In fact this year’s budget has been absolutely devastating for so many schools right across country Victoria. I would just like to firstly address the schools in the Lowan electorate—and I notice the minister has not even got the guts to listen to how he has failed the Warracknabeal community and completely stuffed up the Warracknabeal education precinct. What a gutless wonder, to be wandering out of the chamber after a swift little snide crack and then not have the guts to listen to how he has absolutely stuffed up that project in Warracknabeal. This was a project that The Nationals committed to delivering before the 2014 election. Labor was dragged kicking and screaming in 2016–17 to deliver a paltry amount of money for the special development school (SDS) and the secondary school.

Mr Richardson interjected.

Ms KEALY: I hear from the member for Mordialloc, ‘How much?’. I can tell you what: it was enough to build one-third of the SDS and half of the secondary college. With another pre-election commitment, The Nationals would have developed full funding for that school and got it up properly opened. We are now in a situation where there have been two failed budgets from this Labor government to fix the mess of their own creation. We now have got a special development school which is one-third built—

Mr Richardson interjected.

Ms KEALY: What? You think that it is good? Because we are not in government they think the people in Warracknabeal should be penalised. That is completely disgraceful from the member for Mordialloc.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! Member for Lowan. Through the Chair, please.

Ms KEALY: It is absolutely disgraceful that the member for Mordialloc thinks that the people of Warracknabeal, the students of Warracknabeal, should be penalised because they have got Daniel Andrews as Premier. Well, do you know what? They are being penalised with Daniel Andrews as Premier.

Mr Richardson: On a point of order, Deputy Speaker, I ask the member for Lowan to withdraw. That is not what I was saying. I was saying that during the 57th Parliament they did nothing in government for the Warracknabeal community. I take great offence at what the member for Lowan said, and I ask her to withdraw.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Lowan, you have been asked to withdraw, unconditionally.

Ms KEALY: I withdraw. But the truth hurts, doesn’t it? Look at this SDS. The SDS has had to cut back the programs that are provided to the students. These are specific, specialised education programs for the students at the SDS. There was an agreement that these would be ceased for one year only until the Labor government provided additional funding to finish this project, and that was not delivered. So now these students have permanently lost these education programs, which were designed specifically to their needs.

Further, you have got students who are still up at the secondary college, where there are cracks in the walls you can fit a fist in, where there is possum urine leaking through the ceiling—and where there is an abundance of high-risk asbestos, which students are exposed to every day and you have not funded for removal, which you promised to remove by 2020 and have not delivered on. You have lied to the local people. So we have got the best laboratory—the best science lab with Bunsen burners and fume cupboards—all set up in the Warracknabeal Secondary College, which is half built, which they cannot use because they are stuck up at the old site and cannot relocate fully down to the new site. It is now being used as a site where they are educating SDS students, and they cannot actually use the space because it is not purpose-built. Our secondary students are missing out in Warracknabeal, our SDS students are missing out in Warracknabeal, and you have done nothing. Labor have done nothing but simply turn their back on this community. I want to give full credit to the Warracknabeal community because they have developed a fantastic social media presence through the Warracknabeal education precinct project page. You look at it on Twitter and you look at what they are doing on Facebook—you look at how they are infiltrating media, and yet Labor still will not listen to them. These are students who are missing out. These are the next generation of nurses, the next generation of agronomists and the next generation of doctors in the region, and Labor is letting them down.

It is complete and utter nonsense that Labor continue to talk about the values and priorities they have. We know what the priority is for the Labor government, and it is certainly not education for every single Victorian. They are certainly not delivering for all Victorians. They are missing out on delivering for the students who live in country Victoria, and it is an absolute disgrace and a shame and a blight on this government, and particularly the Premier and the Minister for Education, that they refuse to deliver on these key priority projects.

It is not just the Warracknabeal education precinct that has missed out in my electorate. I remember when Minister Pulford came to Baimbridge College in Hamilton, assembled the students and promised those students—‘We will give you $8.4 million’—to redevelop their school. This was a project that The Nationals also committed to before the election. But what happened in the budget papers? It was not in there. It is not even in the forward estimates. It is not in the list of schools that they expect to be built before the end of this term of Parliament. This was a blatant lie directly to the face of students who go to Baimbridge College in Hamilton, and I absolutely am appalled to think that the Premier or the minister or any of the speakers on the Labor side would dare to say that they are holding the values and priorities of this state first and foremost and that education is their number one priority—because, jeez, you are letting down a lot of students.

There are so many other schools around our regions that you have completely missed out on. Swan Hill Specialist School—they do not have any private rooms. An allied health team is currently forced to set up in the hallways to see students who need support. This is completely unacceptable for SDS students. Wangaratta High School is looking for $5 million to finish the final stage of the school’s master plan, which includes a new basketball stadium to be used by the students and as a community facility—a high priority for that region, but again Labor have failed to deliver. Cohuna Secondary College: the classrooms at the school are more than 50 years old. The school community is currently heavily involved in making sure the work that needs to be done is done. They are looking for funds to develop a master plan to upgrade the school, but are Labor listening? No, they are not, because they do not deliver good educational opportunities and outcomes for people who live in country Victoria.

Benalla P–12 College: the Benalla community agreed to merge the two high schools and three primary schools into a single school way back in 2007. Now that it is complete the schools have merged but the school’s budget has been cut by $1.6 million, and of course they want to see that restored. They have got students who require these funds to get the best possible educational opportunities that they can have. Why is Labor cutting funding to education? It makes you think that everything that Labor says is not actually true. In fact what they seem to say is not what happens in real life. It is like a total charade when it comes to Victoria being the Education State. It is fortunate we are sort of brainwashed—that it is on our numberplates—but we are going to have a next generation of kids who will not even be able to read the numberplates to think that we are in the Education State. It is an absolute disgrace, and it needs to be addressed.

Seymour College: the rebuild is underway, but the college is still waiting on the funds for the final stage of the project. Again, it has not been delivered. Kyabram P–12 College needs funding for a complete regeneration project that has stalled since—guess what—Daniel Andrews has been Premier. As I said, Baimbridge College and the Warracknabeal education precinct are a massive failure and a lie to these local people, letting down local students. Horsham Primary School is a really important school in the Horsham community. It looks after some amazing kids, and it has got a really high number of kids from Aboriginal backgrounds. There are chunks of wall falling off, and there is difficulty for students in wheelchairs to access the building—again, not funded by the Andrews Labor government. They turn a blind eye.

Members interjecting.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! Member for Hastings, member for Mordialloc, please stop yelling across the chamber.

Ms KEALY: Over in eastern Victoria the Latrobe Special Developmental School have had no work to upgrade. Traralgon College—no funding. Hazelwood North Primary School is an old school; it desperately needs upgrades to give these students the best possible start in life—again, not funded. Foster Primary School is looking for an additional $2.5 million to complete the rebuild—not funded. Bairnsdale Secondary College needs $15 million for stage 2 of its redevelopment—not funded.

So to Labor MPs who are making these contributions about how much Labor are looking after the educational opportunities of people who live in Victoria, have a good look at that data, because the evidence suggests that you are completely wrong. The evidence suggests that you are setting up a second-class group of citizens who are not going to have the best educational opportunities and start to life. And certainly we will not be able to look back and remember this time as a time when this government delivered to create the best possible educational opportunities for our region.

The one thing that I do agree with that has been mentioned by previous speakers from the other side is that this is all about Labor’s values and priorities. Their values and priorities are completely out of order. (Time expired)

 Ms RICHARDS (Cranbourne) (15:13): It is with great joy that I stand to speak on this matter of public importance and highlight the impact it is going to have on the community that I serve. Of course there are several elements of this matter of public importance that relate specifically to Cranbourne, but I would like to start by emphasising the impact of the statewide school dental program on the community I represent. ‘Dan’s vans’ is going to be a game changer. Oral disease is one of the costliest health conditions to treat, yet it is one of the most preventable. Not only that—it is the highest cause of avoidable hospitalisations for children under 10 in Victoria.

I am particularly committed to this program because I have seen firsthand the effect of poor oral health on people trying to get employment. Many years ago I worked in a recruitment role and spent so many heartbreaking hours interviewing people for jobs who had such damaged teeth and were so impacted by their appearance that they would not remove their hands from their faces. This affected their confidence and had a domino effect that had consequences for their employment; for some it even impacted on their opportunity to break the cycle of poverty. I particularly remember a woman who desperately wanted to get back into the workforce whose teeth were so damaged she had lost her two front teeth. As a child she could not afford dental care and she certainly could not afford it for her own children.

When this commitment was first announced I thought back to those countless people I had met who had effectively been locked out of the job market because of their inability to access the care they needed. I have known many families who have made appointments for their children to see a dentist, conscious that there was pain or there had been an oral health condition that had been brought to their attention, and they cancelled the appointment at the dentist because either they could not take the time off work or they could not afford the cost. As you would be aware, Deputy Speaker, it is precisely those who are unable to take time off work for their children to see dentists that this program will impact the most. Of course our children who access this program will have better oral health into their adulthood. What a terrific legacy, a legacy of values—well children with access to the best care at their school. This will make a huge difference to the future wellbeing of Victoria’s children.

I was delighted when we made this extraordinary commitment back in November last year before the election. To see that this program has been funded in this the first year will have a profound impact on many families. It will deliver free dental care to schoolchildren through a fleet of 250 dental vans with an investment of $321.9 million. The Smile Squad arrived in my neighbourhood one Sunday a couple of weeks ago, and together with the Premier, the Minister for Health in the other place and my good friend the member for Bass, we could not smiling, because this was an initiative of which we were just so proud. Bringing dental vans back to schools means that kids can get the care they need while at school, saving parents time and money—an investment in our kid’s health, further freeing up existing public dental programs so that more adults can get faster dental care. This is starting in term 3 this year, and I am particularly delighted that Cranbourne, together with Box Hill, Wodonga and South Barwon, will be the first areas to benefit. This program will be rolling out across the state and progressively scaled up.

A couple of Sundays ago I was fortunate to distribute dental packs consisting of toothbrushes, toothpaste and a brochure to help families understand how to make the most of this important opportunity to prevent oral ill health. I would like to take the opportunity to thank Jinny Varghese for bringing his family—his children ended up being the stars of the show—and Dinesh and Gayani Weerakkody as well for being there as we announced that this program was going to start this year. Bringing back school dental vans: this $321.9 million commitment and delivering free dental care to all Victorian children will be an absolutely incredible change to the way we operate in this state. We will be saving parents time and money, delivering a check-up followed by the follow-up care required to school kids every year.

We know that dental treatment costs around $400 per child per year, and the evidence is that families are often skipping appointments, whether because of cost or because of time pressures. Under the Andrews Labor government and this flagship school dental program, all treatments will be covered free of charge, except cosmetic procedures such as orthodontics. No financial cap to the treatment will be provided, and the program will be demand-driven. That means Victorian mums and dads can rest assured that while the Andrews Labor government is in office the state of the family budget will no longer dictate the state of their kids’ teeth because this is what the Andrew’s Labor government’s values are about—ensuring high quality, equitable access irrespective of your means—and that is what our school dental vans will deliver.

This extraordinary reform comes at a time when the contrast to the federal Liberal government could not be greater. Our dental system has been hit hard by the federal government’s savage 30 per cent cuts to funding. They pulled the plug on the dental funding partnership with the states and replaced it with a new cost-cutting scheme. This means tens of thousands of people are being added to the waiting list each year. In contrast, Victorian funding has increased over this time.

But we cannot wait for the feds. We will be providing free dental care to all kids by bringing these vans back to school, employing 500 dentists, oral health therapists and dental assistants to staff the 250 vans which will roll out across the state. This program has been heralded as an ‘excellent step forward’ by the Australian Healthcare and Hospitals Association and welcomed wholeheartedly by the Victorian Healthcare Association. This delivery of vans will save parents time. Rolling out during term 3 of this year will mean an incredibly exciting time for Victorian children and Victorian schools. Dental treatment will make massive savings for the family budget. It is the kind of reform that Labor is proud of.

Of course I am proud that this program is rolling out ahead of schedule. We said we would get it done by 2020, but we will actually be treating kids in vans during 2019. Those vibrant, bright-orange Smile Squad bands are hard to miss, as the kids at Clyde Primary learned at the public unveiling of the vans on 26 May. They will start out small and will absolutely progressively scale up. More vans will visit schools every year until the Smile Squad pays a visit to all Victorian public schools. And the service of course is not just for primary school kids; all schoolchildren—teenagers, prep to year 12—will receive free dental treatment and health information every year.

Each year public schools will be visited by the Smile Squad: 500 oral health therapists, dental assistants and dentists will be employed by Dental Health Services Victoria, and I would like to give them a shout-out for bringing this program together. First, the screening van, about the size of a combi van, will visit to provide each child with a check-up as well as a preventative health pack. For those children identified as requiring treatment a separate treatment van about the size of a truck will return shortly after. The treatment van will include a dental chair and specialist dental treatment equipment. For the small number of procedures that cannot be done in a dental van, such as major dental surgery, students will be offered a referral to a public dental service where they can receive their treatment free of charge. Examples of the kinds of treatments covered include radiographs, teeth cleaning, application of fluoride, dental sealants, fillings, root canals and impressions for mouthguards. Parents of course will be required to provide consent for the treatment and will be welcome to attend the appointment in the van with their child if they wish.

Make no mistake: this is a massive undertaking. Victorians will soon become familiar with these 250 bright orange Smile Squad vans, which will hit the road and reach all government schools by 2022. And we are excited to be getting on with it. Dental Health Services Victoria is working closely with the Department of Education and Training as well as the Department of Health and Human Services on the logistics to ensure our children throughout the state are ready to welcome dental vans. This is a massive expansion of public dental services and public health care. Of course it will have a positive impact on public dental waiting lists.

Finally, it is important to recognise the impact the school dental van program will have on public dental services more broadly. This program will free up around 100 000 places in the public dental system every year. This is because children who were previously seen in the public system will now be seen at school through additional investment in school dental vans. This is estimated to save the average family around $400 per child per year, because we know private dental costs can range from $185 for a tooth extraction to $280 for a root canal and up to $1600 for a full crown. These procedures will all be free in Victoria for all public school children through this dental school program, and of course all treatments will be covered free of charge, and any financial gap will also be supported. All non-cosmetic dental treatments required in all public schools will be free of charge every year. These are the values that speak to the way the Andrews Labor government supports families, supports children in schools, makes a lifelong change, reduces poverty and changes the way that children in this community operate.

 Ms SHEED (Shepparton) (15:23): I am very pleased to make a contribution on this debate today, and I think if there is one thing we have all learned over the last 30 years, it is that investment in early childhood is the most important thing of all that we can do to ensure that our children have a pathway in life. All studies point in that direction. All studies for so long have shown that it is those first five years that are the most important time of all. But now we are seeing studies looking at the first 1000 days, so up to three years old. That time is also particularly important. But as you go forward and as children move into the education system they will continue to need the supports and the best level of developmental support that they can get to make their years in the education system worthwhile.

In terms of this budget I would like to just make some comment on the free dental care. If there is another thing we all know, it is that what happens in your mouth is really important in terms of your health. It is just so much of an indicator of a person’s health to know what the state of their dental health is. I have to say that I have a brother who has worked in regional Victoria, in Maryborough, for probably 40 years, and he has been on national councils to Canberra, rural alliances and all sorts of things to try to get a better deal for the rollout of dental services, particularly for those groups of people who are so often deprived of the opportunity. That of course includes young children.

The rollout of these dental vans will provide, I think, some amazing services in many places. I just wanted to highlight one of the unintended consequences that could arise in regional areas, and that relates to the fact that dentists are relatively few and far between in regional areas, and often in smaller towns there might only be one or two dentists for the whole community. At this point in time most of the children who are being seen by a dentist are being seen by the dentists in their local community. To be viable they also need to have a continuity of patients running through, so I would ask the government to really carefully look at some of the communities they are going into and how this rollout of the vans might impact on local dentists in smaller towns, because the rest of the community do not want to see a situation where their dentist is in a situation where it is not a viable proposition for them to continue their business in a small town. We all rely on the dental services that are provided by the dental profession.

In 2016 I did my first grievance debate on education in this place, and I referred to the fact that there had been numerous reports, Auditor-General’s reports and the like, that pointed out the discrepancy in the outcomes in education for those young people who live in rural areas as compared to metropolitan areas. Something like 30 per cent of children underperform on those sorts of indicators in rural areas. Their aspirations are low, their opportunities to go on to further education or indeed even complete their secondary education are much poorer and their attendance at university later on or even to achieve a certificate IV at a TAFE college is significantly reduced compared with the opportunities that young people in metropolitan areas have. This has been studied, written about and known about for a very long time.

How do we address that? Well, I just want to tell you that in the Shepparton district I have really decided to take this up as an issue because we have seen four secondary schools in the Shepparton and Mooroopna area underperforming and undervalued. We have seen a significant reduction in enrolments over a period of years. A school like Mooroopna Secondary College back in the mid-1980s had over a thousand students enrolled in it; now it has 300. There are real issues around that. The community has abandoned that school and moved onto another place and into other schools. In the Shepparton district our private schools, our Catholic schools and the Christian school are all bursting at the seams because people have chosen to abandon the secondary state education system.

So something needed to be done about it, and something is being done about it. Over the course of the past two years’ work has been done on developing a Shepparton education plan. That is a zero to 18 plan, and it is designed to look at the whole level of state education from very early childhood through to the end of secondary education, but factoring in what might happen to young people once they leave school. The Shepparton education plan is truly a transformative plan in that what it is choosing to do—and this has been done through consultation over a couple of years and as a result of a strategic advisory committee with community members on it advising the government—is to bring together those four secondary schools onto one campus. It is a model that has not appeared in many places. There will be nine schools of 300 students all on one campus and three neighbourhoods each with three schools, so it is a very innovative and transformative plan. There is no doubt that there are people in my community who are struggling with the notion of what that will look like.

I was very disappointed, I have to say, during the 2018 state election to see the National Party take up this issue as a negative. To preside over regional areas for so long as the incumbent members across many regional areas and not to have advocated for better investment and change in our region and other areas in regional Victoria is an indictment of that party. To have used the last election campaign to put up posters around election booths talking about the super-school as if it was the grim reaper of education in our region was a disgrace. In our region for many, many years there have been various attempts to try and improve the education opportunities and what the education system should look like: how will young people get better opportunities in regional areas such as ours? So I do not have a lot of faith in the National Party as being the provider of educational opportunities, because I have seen what has happened in our area where for years the schools languished with lack of investment. Now you might say that for a lot of that time there was a Labor government, but it is up to the local member of any electorate to advocate for their community, to take it to the government, to take it to the ministers involved and to try and get a better outcome for the students in that area.

As part of the Shepparton education plan, we have the Mooroopna early childhood centre, which is an integrated children’s centre being attached to what is one of our most disadvantaged primary schools in Mooroopna. It is a centre that is going to be based on the Doveton College model, with one point of entry into this school. Parents will be able to be identified as to who may be in need of services, and there will be maternal and child welfare services there, playgroups for mothers, three-year-old kindergarten when it comes—and I will be lobbying the government and I put them on notice that we will be wanting our three-year-old kindergarten rolling out in the Shepparton district much earlier than it is presently slated for—and four-year-old kindergarten and transition into school. So that seamless hub that will develop at that school will really be something extraordinary to have in my electorate and will provide that ability to identify those children who are so vulnerable.

Just in the last few minutes I have left, the Australian early development census figures have just been released. They show that across all indicators the vulnerable group in the Shepparton district in my region is becoming more vulnerable. Across Australia that is not the case; there is improvement happening. So if ever there was an area that needed access to government funding to provide the sorts of services that are being foreshadowed in the budget by the Shepparton education plan and by other early childhood investments, it is my region. I will continue to advocate to ensure that we get our share of the money so that we can educate young people in our community and give them the ability to go on to trades, universities and TAFEs.

 Ms THEOPHANOUS (Northcote) (15:33): It gives me great pleasure to speak on this matter of public importance. All I really need to know about how to live and what to do and how to be, I learned in kindergarten. Wisdom was not at the top of the graduate school mountain but there in the sandpit at Yarralea kinder in Alphington. These are the things that I learned:

Share everything.

Play fair.

Don’t hit people.

Put things back where you found them.

Clean up your own mess.

Don’t take things that aren’t yours.

Say you’re sorry when you hurt somebody.

Wash your hands before you eat.

…

Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you.

Live a balanced life—learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day some.

These are just some of the wise words of poet Robert Fulghum from his Credo. The kindergarten credo is not simple; it is elemental. Everything in life as adults can be drawn back to these words. While it seems somewhat far-fetched, think about this: a child’s brain grows to 90 per cent of its adult size by the age of five. Kindergarten is not the same as school. Kinder is about being emotionally and socially ready for school. Indeed the research shows that young children learn best through play rather than through structured activities. This allows teachers and educators to incorporate children’s interests, responses and needs as they develop to adapt new ways for them to learn and explore. Fundamentally kinder is about teaching our kids to be learners. At kindergarten children learn to work with others and develop social skills, express their creativity, build their communication skills and develop the foundational skills that they need for reading, writing and problem solving. The earlier these vital life skills are developed, the more transformational they are throughout life. That is why last week’s budget delivered by the Andrews Labor government is investing $881.6 million to begin the rollout of the biggest reform in this state’s history when it comes to early childhood education.

I am going to pause there for a moment because I want to reflect on just one word of that last statement—one word—‘invest’, because that is the fundamental difference between those that sit on the other side of the house and those on this side. Those on the other side see this program as a cost, not an investment. This program is of course the rollout of universal subsidised three-year-old kinder for every Victorian child—a program that will give Victorian children every possible opportunity to succeed no matter their background or postcode. The importance of investing in our collective futures is clearly something that escapes those opposite, just as it escapes their friends in Canberra. To their shame this year’s federal Liberal budget includes no funding for three-year-old kinder and has even failed to guarantee funding for four-year-old kinder. Add to this that the Morrison government last year pulled the pin on safety and quality checks for all Victorian childcare centres and dumped occasional childcare funding. What a disgrace—preschool for 80 000 of our littlest Victorians at risk. Surely we can do better than that. We must do better than that, and in Victoria we are doing better than that. Universal kinder is not just about helping young minds grow and starting them on their education journey. Universal three-year-old kinder is a matter of public importance in a way that many of those sitting opposite fail to realise.

Deputy Speaker, as you know, there is no greater happiness than becoming a parent. I have been blessed with being a mum to two lively little girls: Ariana is almost two and Cleo is just three months old. I can scarcely describe the immense joy they bring to my husband and I. But as you know, with parenthood also come immense challenges, and there is perhaps no other role that tests us as parenting does.

No doubt many would agree that going back to work after having children is a balancing act even under the best of circumstances. I know from my own experience that balancing the cost of care with the family budget and the time spent away from the kids is no easy feat. On this front, providing universal access to three-year-old kinder will be a game changer for many families, as it also supports parents, and women in particular, to go back to work. This is a program that could just as easily fall under the Treasurer’s responsibility as it could under the Minister for Education, because three-year-old kinder is also economic policy—it is employment policy. Policy which breaks down barriers to women’s participation in the economy is an issue that is very close to me. In fact there are many members on this side of the chamber whom this policy will directly affect, now or in the very near future. And there is a reason that so many on this side of the chamber are affected by this policy: because this side of the chamber actually supports young women into our ranks, and indeed 50 per cent of our cabinet are women.

But as I said, this policy is economic policy. We know that when women are a productive part of the economy, the economy is stronger. Our economy is stronger and our living standards are higher. According to the Grattan Institute, improving women’s participation in the nation’s economy will add 1 per cent to our gross domestic product, or $25 billion. And like many young mums in my community, access to affordable child care and early childhood education are some of the most significant barriers to participation. It takes a village to raise a child, and I am fortunate to have a very supportive village. Part of that village is the local child care that my older daughter attends, and I look forward to her moving into their kinder program very soon.

These reforms are also an investment when you take into account the longer term effects of children starting kinder as early as possible. We know that the pathway for our young people, especially those at risk, is a very different one if they have access to early education. Learning how to learn at kinder is vital. The dividend of investing in our young people early is savings that we make later in life, whether that is the improved health outcomes or even a reduction in interactions with the justice system.

The health outcomes element brings me to the other part of today’s matter: the $321.9 million for free dental care at all Victorian primary and secondary schools. I know that I have spent a lot my allotted time today speaking on the kinder element of the member for Carrum’s motion and I know that my colleagues have spoken at length on the Smile Squad, but this is Labor policy at its best, because we know that only Labor governments will do this—only Labor governments can do this.

There were pretenders around, but luckily for the people of my electorate they were short-lived, because there is no finer example of how only Labor actually governs for Victoria than this school dental program. The implications and complications that come from poor dental health are rarely recognised to their full extent. This initiative will have a profound positive impact on the lives of young people and older people from Ouyen to Alphington.

We have heard some of these facts today already, but I want to reflect on them. Dental conditions are the highest single cause of preventable hospitalisations for kids under 10. Think about that for a moment; think about the cost to our hospitals right there and the heartache and angst for our families. To be sure, this is a massive expansion of public health care, but the cost of not doing this program far outweighs the benefits that this investment will bring. And there it is again: investment. This program will free up around 100 000 places in the public dental system each year. That is effectively 100 000 more places that can be used by those on the waiting list now.

The dental habits that we learn when we are young continue through life. Teaching young people good habits and having them develop healthily right from the start reduces complications in later years and takes pressure off the system down the track. But once again, that is what separates us from those on the other side of the house. They would say, ‘You’re on your own’. As with many public health matters, their prevention policy is to park the ambulance at the bottom of the cliff. Again, we can do better than that and we must do better than that. And in Victoria the Andrews Labor government is doing better.

 Mr BURGESS (Hastings) (15:42): It is a pleasure to speak on this matter of public importance (MPI). At the start I would like to put on the record that I have no doubt that the member for Northcote was being sincere, truly believed what she was saying and holds those values—that education and dental health and all of those things are really critically important to our communities and to our schools—so I have no argument with that at all. However, what the member for Northcote probably does not know is the extent of the hypocrisy and dishonesty of this government. Really, it only takes an objective view to take a look around the state and see what is really going on and to understand that what you are talking about from your experience in Northcote is entirely different to the experiences that electorates like mine have and schools like mine have. I will give you some detail on that as we go through.

There is a course of conduct that this government involves itself in—and I think anybody within this room would understand that—but to this stage Victorians are still coming to terms with it, although the last budget is certainly going to be a shock to them as they understand what it really means. Some of the statements, like the statement that we are debating today in the MPI or statements such as ‘We are doing this to help the CFA’, are so disingenuous when you consider what is really going on with the CFA and what this government is trying to achieve. With—

Mr Richardson interjected.

Mr BURGESS: I have already had this approved by the Speaker, so that is fine. ‘We are doing this for the CFA’, but then they are bullying volunteers and boards out of existence and destroying groups of local heroes.

Mr Richardson: On a point of order, Deputy Speaker, this is a matter of public importance on education, dental and early childhood. While the CFA matter is really important and will be up for debate very soon, I am not sure where the member for Hastings is in this realm or on this planet.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: I actually do uphold the point of order. I do ask the member for Hastings to come back to the MPI.

Mr BURGESS: On the point of order, Deputy Speaker, the sincerity of the statement is also able to be brought into question here, and that is exactly what I am bringing into question in this debate.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: I would like you to come back to the MPI.

Mr BURGESS: I will. There have been other statements, including about education but not limited to education, made by this government that are disingenuous, and this statement today is disingenuous. It talks about the importance of education. It talks about what is happening in education in schools—but not all schools. It talks about schools in electorates that have Labor members and not coalition members, and it is really clear when you look at my electorate and electorates around me and electorates across the state where there are coalition members that the communities in those areas really are doing it tough. Labor’s MPI today is just the latest in those disingenuous propagandist spiels that this government goes on with.

I can take the house to many of the smaller communities in my electorate and the schools within those communities just to point out the stark difference between the experience that the member for Northcote and other members on the government side of the house are having compared to the experience that we are having on this side of the house. I tried to ask the member for Mordialloc how much investment had gone into his electorate and into his schools. He had no clue. In fact he looked across at me and said, ‘I don’t know’. But I would be able to bring him to the point where—

Mr Richardson: On a point of order, Deputy Speaker, I would like the member for Hastings to withdraw. I take great offence at that. What I was saying was that he would have no clue what equity funding went into his schools in 2015–16. I ask him to withdraw because it is an absolute fabrication and is misleading the house.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: That is a point for debate, member for Mordialloc. The member for Hastings to continue.

Mr BURGESS: People do get sensitive in this house when they are called out on the things they say, whether they are true or incorrect. Certainly the member for Mordialloc is very sensitive about that, but he continues to do it.

Schools in my electorate such as Cranbourne South Primary School have literally gone on for years without the things they need. Certainly they have had petitions, Facebook pages, numerous meetings with the current member for Cranbourne and the previous member for Cranbourne and letters to the minister, both from me and from the school council, all of which have just fallen on deaf ears. They are not being heard at all. While there has been some money spent just recently on it—but mostly on asbestos removal, which the government was required to do anyway—the school had no heating and cooling in block A. It certainly had no emergency maintenance. They asked for that on several occasions and were rejected by this government—that is the government that is so hell-bent on education in this state. They do not have a kiss-and-go area and are unable to have that. Staff have to park on the netball court, so there is no netball for the kids and this reduces outdoor areas. The space ratio is far below most schools as far as kids play is concerned.

Parents have to park in all sorts of different spaces, including in the next-door service station, so that they can actually get to the school. The drainage for the septic system was unsafe. There were telecommunication issues. They have an antiquated phone system, and there is no security system in the school. They have to replace the rotted foundations under the admin building. There are rotted gutters, eaves and fascias, and the roof is extremely poor. They have had to quarantine classrooms because of mould. They have limited meeting spaces, and only half the staff can fit into the staffroom. There are plumbing issues, with unstable plumbing under block A. There is spider web electrical circuitry across block A as well. As I say, some has been done, but is that a surprise? Because when you look at the school, the school actually has more parents out of the Cranbourne electorate than it does out of my electorate now—but that has only just happened because it is a Labor area. You have got more families coming out of a Labor electorate.

A member interjected.

Mr BURGESS: You are making the same point that I am making, so I am glad we are in agreement on that. If it is a Labor electorate, the money goes in. If it is a coalition electorate, you do not want to know about it. That is exactly what is happening here, and that is just the first of the schools.

If we go further into the schools, at Langwarrin Primary School there is no air conditioning in new block A. I wrote to the minister. What did the minister say? ‘You have got to get it yourself. We do not care if the kids are too hot. We do not care if it is stiflingly hot on those days. You have got to raise that money yourself just for the cooling and that air conditioning’. I brought it up with the minister. Of course the critical need is for kids to be able to get out of those classrooms on those boiling hot days, and $140 000 is a lot of money for a school to raise by itself. But then again, this government is so committed to education that it is out there helping these schools.

Langwarrin Park Primary School has no playground. What do you say to that? There is no playground in this school. I have written to the minister, and the minister’s response was again, ‘You’re going to have to find the money yourself’. Is that the experience of the Labor members? Because if that is the experience of the Labor members, why are you not in here saying that? Why are you not in here saying that this government is short-changing education instead of coming in here and saying exactly the opposite? The reason is that money goes into your electorates. Nothing goes into the coalition electorates because this government is not committed at all to education. It is committed to politics, and that is exactly what you show every time you open your mouth.

At Somerville Rise Primary School the years 3 to 4 middle playground is taped off. You cannot get to the playground, and there is no shade. There is not even any shade for these kids to play under in this school. That is the kind of existence that these kids have to put up with because they have a government that does not care about them or their education. It only cares about the circumstances in Labor electorates. Christine was one of the parents who came to me and brought this to my attention. The response we got back from the minister, believe it or not, was that schools are required to ensure there is sufficient shelter and trees to adequately shade school grounds. That is the school’s responsibility. So the kids do not have somewhere to go to play, the kids do not have somewhere to go to get into the shade, and the minister’s response is, ‘That’s your problem’.

I am sure that is not the experience you are having over in Cranbourne or in Mordialloc, but that is the experience the coalition electorates are having under this government. What this MPI should be saying is that this government is good on education in your electorates and terrible on education in other electorates. You have got a Premier who is an admitted socialist—he is an admitted Socialist Left Premier—who thinks that socialism is the redistribution of wealth from all electorates into Labor electorates. That is what he thinks. He is raising taxes from the state to put into your electorates so that my community gets no benefit from any of them—except they get the debt to be paid by your government— (Time expired)

 Mr TAYLOR (Bayswater) (15:52): What a great privilege it is to rise in this house, to follow that great contribution and to speak on this matter of public importance. We are proudly the Education State in Victoria, and it is not just a phrase. It is not just something that we put on a numberplate, like the Coalition will proudly say that their time in government was the Education State. When a Labor government is in power, we live it and we breathe it. It would be remiss of me not to mention that I seriously question whether those opposite are as committed to building an Education State as this government is.

Mr Halse interjected.

Mr TAYLOR: Absolutely not, the member for Ringwood says. Absolutely not; they are not committed. We say budgets are about choices, and they are. We compare budgets and look at the staggering differences in recent times when we have been in government and when those opposite have been. The difference is $4.4 billion—

Mr Battin: Deputy Speaker, I direct your attention to the state of the house.

Quorum formed.

Mr TAYLOR: Not only are budgets a choice but we saw that last November each party had a choice. This government has done absolutely everything to properly fund education, and those opposite have gone absolutely missing. I did not hear much from the member for Eildon about reforms to early years, to our TAFE system, on the roll-out of dental vans or to guaranteed funding for four-year-old preschool, and once again it was crickets on three-year-old preschool.

This government’s choice was a positive one. We do not rip money out from schools. We do not close TAFEs. We choose to back in education because we know about the difference that it makes. Personally I know the difference that a quality education makes. I did it pretty tough in my childhood, like so many others, and education for me was truly a beacon of hope. It was a place where I could go to be safe, learn and build relationships, and that is exactly why investment in education across all spectrums—whether it be three and four-year-old preschool, dental vans or our TAFE system—is so absolutely important.

We have come a long way from my time in the 1990s and early 2000s. I remember it like it was yesterday. It reminds me of when I went to school. We had Harold the Giraffe. Do you all remember Harold the Giraffe? Good old Harold! We loved him. But now we have got Dan’s vans and the Smile Squad. The nicknames will no doubt continue. While the affectionate names will continue to move about—there is always a bit of movability in these things—the government’s commitment to the dental health of young people in this state does not. It does not move, because we are bringing the vans back. We are investing $322 million in our commitment to deliver free dental care to all children in Victorian government schools by 2022. Normally I would not quote the Prime Minister, but how good are Dan’s vans? Surely even ScoMo would love Dan’s vans. These are game changers. We said we would get them out by 2020, but during last year’s campaign, often like we do, we went one better. These bad boys are hitting the streets already. They are hitting the streets in Barwon South, in Cranbourne and in Wodonga. They will be out there by term 3 this year. Our dental vans are not just for primary students; they are for all students in all of our state schools. They will cover things like teeth cleaning, fillings, root canals and impressions of mouth guards.

This program has no financial cap, meaning it is demand-driven. It will save families up to $400 per child per year on average because that is what we are about: we are about reducing the cost of living and supporting families who are doing it tough right across this state. This will do exactly that.

Why are we doing this? Well, because, as the member for Northcote pointed out recently, a quarter of Australia’s children have untreated tooth decay and in Victoria dental conditions are the highest single cause of preventable hospitalisations under 10. Something has got to change, and Dan’s vans will go to addressing exactly that. Oral disease absolutely is preventable, so it is our job to do something about it.

We know that dental care is available for kids up to 12, but only 20 per cent of people use it. This will make it convenient and ensure parents are not having to run around from appointment to appointment. That will now be a thing of the past, and this will be across every single state school. This is good policy, it is smart policy and it will prevent significant outlays in our health system when it is too late, because this will stop it at the root cause.

Members interjecting.

Mr TAYLOR: Oh yes, oh yes! And another added benefit: it will free up our public dental health waiting lists for adults and those who need it most even more now. Approximately 100 000 places will free up, helping us to save resources and money down the track.

Once again this government proudly does the heavy lifting on health and education whilst we hear very little from the member for Eildon on this, as per usual, and even less from the federal government, who have cut adult dental services by 30 per cent. The Liberals are just shameful on this.

This government is proudly delivering on its promise to deliver the biggest reform in the history of our state, with three-year-old kinder for every Victorian child. There is $881 million in the budget, signed, sealed and delivered by the honourable Treasurer himself, to begin the rollout, guaranteeing as well subsidised kinder three and four-year-olds.

As a former councillor I spent two years bickering and advocating. I cannot overstate how hard it was to get the federal government on board from year to year to guarantee funding for four-year-olds. They are not interested in three-year-old kinder. Getting them to the table on four-year-olds always happened in the depths of the night, always keeping us waiting and keeping parents and the community in angst. Once again our four-year-olds and their parents and families are being held to ransom. The 80 000 Victorian young people who access these preschool services are being held to ransom, with the federal government not promising federal funding for four-year-old preschool beyond 2021. Regardless of any factor, they are not at all interested in three-year-old preschool.

We are guaranteeing four-year-old preschool and we are also guaranteeing 15 hours of preschool for all three-year-old children, with a guarantee of 5 hours of subsidised three-year-old kinder by 2022. As part of this reform we have already begun conducting site assessments of the facilities across the state. There will be 1000 new or expanded facilities across the state over the next decade. That is big news. My community understands this need. We understand the research that shows the profound difference that three-year-old preschool makes in the lives of all young children, as young Paisley does, the young daughter of the member for Mordialloc. She is looking forward to three-year-old preschool; she is absolutely looking forward to three-year-old preschool, as the member’s Instagram account does so record.

This commitment will allow our children to learn through play earlier, learn to work with others and build the communication and cognitive skills they so need. It will also create jobs—4000 extra teachers and 2000 educators, so it is about local jobs as well.

A member interjected.

Mr TAYLOR: Absolutely—jobs, jobs, jobs. We know that education is where it all starts. We know that giving a child the best start in life through a properly funded system, reforming early years and providing free TAFE will change education in this great state forever. We on this side of the house know this. My community in Bayswater knows this. This Labor tradition runs deep within me. That is why when I was elected I visited by the end of December nearly every single one of the 17 schools in my electorate. I visited absolutely all of them—some four, five or six times. I visited lots of our preschools, and I further understand their needs. I am getting on with delivering for our community, as this government delivers for all schools across this great state. It is about building relationships. It is so important to do that with our local schools. Those opposite would not quite get that. I dare hazard a guess that many on that side would not be able to name every single school in their electorate. I would hazard a guess, and I would be happy to put $20 on it. It is one of the best things that I do. In this budget—

Mr Riordan: How many have you got? Five?

Mr TAYLOR: Seventeen. In this budget I was proud to announce with the Deputy Premier $1.39 million going to Bayswater Primary School to revolutionise the learning spaces. As he said to the young people, ‘We’re knocking the building down and we’re building a new one’. There will also be new toilet and administration facilities worth $1.32 million at Boronia Heights Primary School. I am also proud that in the last four years we invested $7.2 million more into local school infrastructure funding in my electorate than when those opposite were in power. And 80 per cent of their investment was into one school, with many missing out, which was an absolute disgrace.

It has been wonderful to get out and work with these local schools, and not only to invest in local schools in my electorate, like we have done recently, but also to put $1.6 million into the Bayswater children and family learning centre, which will be opening very soon. The good member for Carrum over there is looking forward to coming out. We are going to be opening it. It is a beautiful place. And I tell you what: that is what we are about. We will not back down from education reform. We will not give up on our schools like those opposite. We will always properly fund them. We will deliver Dan’s vans, we will deliver free TAFE and we will guarantee three and four-year-old preschool and create the jobs of the future while doing so because we are Labor. It is the decent and human thing to do. We will always invest more and above in education than those opposite.