Wednesday, 6 March 2024

Matters of public importance

Education

The SPEAKER (16:01): I have accepted a statement from the member for Niddrie proposing the following matter of public importance for discussion:

That this house notes that Victoria is the Education State, with the Allan Labor government implementing a range of policies to ensure all students get the best start in life.

Ben CARROLL (Niddrie – Minister for Education, Minister for Medical Research) (16:01): Education is not just a nice thing to invest in, it is the single most important public investment in our future. On this side of the chamber we know any conversation about opportunity must include education, the most fundamental building block to success. Nelson Mandela once said, ‘Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world,’ and no doubt those words are so apt and true as I speak on my feet right here and right now.

In the Education State every child deserves a good-quality education no matter where they live or what size or how much they have in their bank account. We know it is the most important tool to ensure every child has the best possible start in life and to support their aspirations. That is why our Labor government has built more schools than any other state. We know it is difficult to inspire students on the relevance and importance of education if the school around them is falling down. That is why we have invested a record more than $14 billion in building our schools, upgrading schools more than any other state or territory across our nation. That is why Victorian kids are at the top of their class according to NAPLAN. That is why we want every child to aspire, because we value education.

Just last week I spoke to more than 100 leaders at our annual Education State forum. First and foremost, I shared my thanks to them for the work they have done through the recent pandemic and are doing today – teachers, parents, business managers, volunteers, principals and many more. That is why it is the work of every one of my colleagues to recognise how important it is to make sure every child, each of whom is unique, gets the education they deserve.

It was very humbling to see the recent report by the Productivity Commission on government services, and if you just go through it, what the Productivity Commission report showed is that the Victorian government’s total recurrent investment in schools has grown faster than any other jurisdiction. Victoria’s investment per student has grown at a higher rate than any other jurisdiction. Victoria leads the country on proportion of school leavers fully engaged in education or work. School attendance rates continue to be above the Australian average, and Victoria continues to rank first for secondary school attendance. Victoria has the second-highest year attainment rate behind South Australia for year 12. Our record and our strong investments are paying dividends as I speak. We have strong and skilled teachers at our core.

Over the last 10 years our government has reshaped government schools. I know I do not have all the time in the world, but let me just go through what we have been able to deliver for the next couple of minutes: mental health practitioners, the Schools Mental Health Fund, the Head Start apprenticeships and traineeships, doctors in secondary schools and the Navigator program. We are supporting disadvantaged students through the Camps, Sports and Excursions Fund; the tutor learning initiative; affordable school uniforms; free period products in all government schools; free school breakfasts, recently celebrating the 4 millionth with a wonderful event I did with the Premier and the member for Tarneit; Glasses for Kids; and school Smile Squad. One of my favourite programs is our out-of-school-hours care program, which is really supporting young people but also their parents and students with disabilities, extending out-of-school-hours care so those students are in a familiar setting that they know. Then it is helping young parents and, on the eve of International Women’s Day, young mothers in particular to go and take on additional study or additional work. It is great. It has got that double dividend of helping the young people and helping their parents as well. That is what social policy, the care economy and the education system are all about, and that is why we value what we are doing.

We have got the student excellence program, the primary mathematics and science specialists, we have got the reduced face-to-face teaching hours program, the active schools program and we have got the additional school nurses and allied health services program. We have also established the Victorian Academy of Teaching and Leadership – and it was wonderful for me to be able to host all the education ministers from around the nation recently at the academy and also to pay tribute to my predecessor James Merlino, who set that academy up, where we celebrated more than 150 years of public education in our state. That is a lasting legacy for the former Deputy Premier and member for Monbulk. I know the current member for Monbulk is following in his footsteps, always in my ear advocating for her local schools. As a former teacher in Monbulk, what a fantastic segue to have the new member for Monbulk in here doing a fantastic job.

I spoke about new schools – not 10, not 11, not 12, but I opened 14 new schools literally over the past month. It has been a very busy period, but that is what happens when you have a Labor government, the Allan Labor government, investing $14.9 billion in schools. We are very proud of what we have been able to do. Fourteen new schools have increased the capacity across our state for an additional 9000 students, particularly in our growth suburbs, which I know many members in this chamber are so passionate about. We are very proud of this. The member for Kalkallo Minister Spence, the Premier and I were there on the very first day at Yubup Primary School in Mickleham with principal Maree Moyle. She took us on an exclusive tour of the new school. It was wonderful also to be with the member for Kororoit and see that wonderful school the Dharra School, one of the new special schools, located in Aintree. And the member for Kororoit will agree with me about just that special feeling you get when you are at a specialist school and you see the parents, the faces – what it means to them having a government put their shoulder to the wheel investing more than $1.8 billion on inclusive education to give those young people and their parents every start we can. I was also very proud to visit the Kurmile Primary School on the other side of town, in Officer. I have been there with the member for Pakenham – I do not know if she is in the chamber. We have been there twice already. It is only a brand new school and we have been there twice – that is how well we respect education and principal Sharon Mitchell for what she is doing.

There are school openings but also school modernisations. Since we have come to government we have delivered more than 1940 school upgrades. There is a $2 billion investment in schools in the recent budget, and we are doing everything we can through a $356 million investment for 47 upgrades and modernisation projects. We are also investing $10 million for minor capital works to ensure that all of our schools get the start and all of our students get every opportunity in through the school gates.

I touched before on the inclusive education and what it means for every family and every student. There could be nothing more important. Our government has invested $1.6 billion over four years – $690 million invested in disability inclusion. Many people on this side of the chamber will remember the former Premier’s speech at the campaign launch when he talked about the SEC. The other thing the former Premier the former member for Mulgrave spoke about was the outside school hours care program that I touched on. That is a game changer that we are rolling out. It will make a big difference to parents and to young people. Disability inclusion is about capability building, and that is what we are about on this side of the chamber. Our commitment includes $121 million for outside school hours care. We are investing $21.2 million in the NDIS navigators program that is helping families deal with the national disability insurance scheme. We know it is a wonderful scheme – a wonderful legacy of former Prime Minister Gillard, and I know the federal member for Maribyrnong and government services minister Bill Shorten is also working hard on it. We know that often families find it incredibly hard to navigate, and that is why we are rolling out at our specialist schools the navigators program to support those families. I had the great pleasure very early in my tenure as the Minister for Education to be out at the school of the deaf to make that announcement about the navigators program in our disability schools.

But we are also making sure we do other things. We know the importance of therapy pools. The evidence is in about how a therapy pool can also support so many children with disabilities in school hours, so rolling out a $25 million investment for specialist schools to apply and install therapy pools is really, really important. We are very proud of that. I want to say nothing gives more pleasure than being out and seeing what we are doing, whether it is in Craigieburn at the Wayi School or whether recently at the Victorian College for the Deaf, our disability schools and our disability sector are outstanding. Any conversation about opportunity must include people of all abilities and all backgrounds. I know as Minister for Education and as a former employment minister, one of my favourite ABC programs is Employable Me. We know it starts with education. We know that for people with neurodiverse backgrounds, whether it is in banking or whether it is in public transport, there is a role and an avenue for them to be very much encouraged as strong participants in our economic and social workforce. We are very proud of that on this side of the chamber, and to have the member for Eltham here, who I know is so passionate about this in her portfolios, is excellent.

I mentioned previously the breakfast clubs, the music in schools program and a lot of other programs that we are so very proud of. I am often asked, ‘What are you going to do as education minister to build on your predecessor’s work, Ben?’ I say, ‘I want to be on the side of teachers.’ There can be no more important role than that of our teaching workforce, and Jason Clare himself said this to me recently. What we are doing in Victoria means we have more people applying to be teachers here than anywhere else. I was at an ASEAN dinner last night with the Premier, and they were talking about the Education State. They noticed it on our numberplates. They know we put our money where our mouth is, and we invest in it. We are getting on with the job of making sure we have the strongest workforce. That is why we are seeing that school vacancies are a lot lower compared to last year. It is why we are seeing more than 50,000 teachers that work across our government schools doing an outstanding job. But it is no accident. The Allan Labor government has invested more than $1.6 billion in workforce initiatives. It is about getting on and supporting them.

The member for Mulgrave and I were out with the Premier recently to discuss some of those initiatives to support more people through the different programs with the paid placements. Whether it is for the disability sector or whether it is for rural and regional Victoria, some of those hard-to-reach places for schoolteachers, we are putting money on the table – to help them with rent, to help with the cost-of-living issues and to incentivise them to go to those schools. And it is working. It is paying dividends. This is stuff that is not happening anywhere else in Australia. We have got the teaching scholarships. As I said before, they have led to an almost 10 per cent increase in people becoming teachers. I was with Chancellor John Brumby at La Trobe University at the science of language and reading lab last week. They are getting more and more people wanting to go in and become teachers, because they know if you want to make a difference on disadvantage, if you want to shift the dial on anyone’s life, it begins with education. We have got the teaching scholarships. We have got the Teach Today and Teach Tomorrow programs, providing 1200 funded accelerated employment-based teaching degrees. We have got the paid placements. We could not be more proud of what we are doing. We have got the Career Start program to support students.

Finally, I just want to say often the narrative can be quite negative. You only have to pick up the newspapers or get online and often the narrative can be negative. But having been at the Education State Forum with 100 leaders last week, we should be so positive about education in this state. We sometimes think in election cycles, but having been in office for over nine years, we are only really just hitting our stride now with what the Productivity Commission handed down recently – on growing our teacher workforce, student-to-teacher ratios and making sure we continue to invest in Indigenous students. Their attendance rates are the best they have been right here in Victoria and are leading the nation. We have got a lot more to do, though, and we want to make sure that we continue to work right across our sector to ensure the public narrative and the perception is very much in line with what it is today – growing our teaching workforce, building more schools than anywhere else and with Victorian kids at the top of the class, according to NAPLAN. And the wonderful thing is, in the minute I have got left, we have got so much more to do – 100 new schools by 2026.

Many people in this chamber have spoken on the recent legislation concerning the 50 government-owned childcare centres, and we know the importance of the first 1000, 2000 days of a child’s life. The Best Start, Best Life initiative – a game changer with free four- and three-year-old kinder – is really setting everyone up for life. From preschool to primary and secondary school and then whether it is university or a vocational education, in the Education State there is every opportunity for every individual to fulfil their dreams, go on and have a wonderful education and then embed in their employment lifelong education so they continue to go back to uni, do micro-credentialing or go back to TAFE. We are known as the government that restored TAFE; that came up at a dinner last night with ASEAN leaders. We are known as the government that puts education front and centre, and it is why we are the Education State – and we are not done yet.

Jess WILSON (Kew) (16:16): I am delighted to rise to speak on the matter of public importance today submitted by the Minister for Education the member for Niddrie:

That this house notes that Victoria is the Education State, with the Allan Labor government implementing a range of policies to ensure all students get the best start in life.

From the outset, we on this side of the house cannot be clearer that we do not think that this could be further from the truth. It is a true misnomer to call Victoria the Education State. From the outset can I say I agree with the education minister’s points around the importance of providing quality education for all Victorian children. Making sure that all Victorian children have the very best start to life is critical to the work we do in this place and the investments we make in education right across the board.

Every opportunity needs to be given to students to achieve their full potential, and I think the minister’s characterisation in particular around the work we do right across Victoria in special schools is a great example of where we do have a lot of bipartisan support. I have had the opportunity to visit many of these schools – Emerson School in the outer areas of Melbourne, Belmore School in my own electorate ‍– to see the amazing work that educators and teachers do in these schools to make sure students can reach their own full potential and have access to inclusive education. There have been debates recently, particularly at the federal level, around the future of specialised education – suggestions that over time it should be phased out – and I think if you speak to any parent or family that chooses to send their child to a special school, they will tell you the benefits of that education. We on this side and, I think it is fair to say, those on the opposite side agree wholeheartedly on the opportunities that specialised education can provide for students right across the board, and we want to make sure we can continue to provide those into the future.

But on the topic today of the Education State, there are a number of points that we on this side of the house would like to point to that suggest that this slogan the government likes to put out there – as the minister said, to be seen on licence plates across Victoria – is meaningless to Victorian students, teachers and families that are experiencing every single day the dire state of Victoria’s education system. I will start with the state of our schools and the many government schools that I hear about on a daily basis that are falling into disrepair because the Labor government is intent on a policy of go slow when it comes to particularly urgent maintenance requests from schools.

Just last week we saw children at Balnarring Primary School locked out of their classrooms because of the presence of toxic mould – a situation that continues to unfold. The school reported this immediately to the Victorian School Building Authority, and like for other schools that have experienced situations when it comes to mould and urgent maintenance requests, the VSBA simply did not act. Parents were rightly overwhelmed by the situation because when you send your kids to school you would think that you are sending them to a safe and hygienic environment, but unfortunately in this case that simply was not the case. I quote from a parent, Jess, from the school:

This is a huge displacement and disruption to their learning, especially students in year five that have NAPLAN coming up, they’ve got none of their resources including laptops and pencil cases as they were left in the building …

Other mothers have also expressed concerns about their child’s health, some students have had asthma and other issues.

We are really disappointed with the lack of action from the government and we feel like as parents that our calls are not being answered.

This is an unacceptable situation, but sadly it is far from unique when it comes to the Allan government’s so-called Education State. We can look at Northcote High, who have shared their concern about structural cracking in their hall. A floor collapsed in a classroom at Fitzroy North Primary School last year, and more than a year later the plastic remains covering the entrance to that room, with access still not possible for students. Students are confined to learning in the school’s hall. I have spoken before – and I do not think the member for Tarneit is here – about Tarneit P–9, which in its own principal’s words is a ‘portable city’, not keeping up with the pace of demand and not putting in place permanent learning facilities.

In my own electorate, at Canterbury Girls Secondary College a wall literally collapsed during school hours. Luckily, no-one was hurt – everyone was in class at the time – but for years upon years Canterbury Girls has been calling out for urgent funding and has not received funding in decades. To have a wall collapse at this school was simply shocking for the students and teachers who were there at the time. In Sandringham there has not been any heating in the junior campus for two years, there are not enough toilets for teachers and the corridors still flood despite roof repairs. There is a similar story in my own electorate at Balwyn Primary School, where there are simply not enough toilets for students. The school council president at Camberwell Primary has said four classrooms have been closed for two years because they are just deplorable. I know in the member for Euroa’s electorate at Broadford Secondary classes are being held in corridors because classrooms are simply not in a state to be used, with a locker room closed due to asbestos. And at Mildura West Primary School, after two master plans – years upon years of master plans being developed – the school is still being held together by plywood.

I could go on and on, but government schools throughout Victoria are being forced to shut classrooms and cordon off buildings, and as the record debt in this state continues to grow, we can see it is really starting to bite due to the ageing infrastructure causing hazards for students and the maintenance not being kept up with. And we know the response from the government is literally to cover their ears and pretend this is not happening. We have heard that from the minister today. They do not want to hear it and they are not interested in actually fixing it, but we need to make sure that every single student and every single teacher in every single government school across this state has a safe and hygienic environment to learn in. This is the most basic of standards that we are failing to provide our students and teachers, and the Allan government needs to step up and provide this urgent maintenance as soon as possible.

I turn now to the teacher crisis, and we have heard just today from the minister during question time about the government’s plans to deal with the workforce challenges in this space. But the reality is schools simply cannot find the teachers that they need. This is a story I hear every single time I visit a school. Every single school I visit talk about the fact that, touch wood, they have got enough teachers to last them until the end of term 1, and then they will deal with what happens after that and try to find the next round of teachers. As of today there are 1466 teaching vacancies across Victoria.

Some regional schools received less than one application for every teacher job that they advertised last year. Labor’s teacher shortage crisis was years in the making, and the reality is it is compromising our learning outcomes and the quality education that students deserve. We know now that there are examples of VCE classes being cancelled across the state for unknown periods of time and students being told to do private study because their VCE classes do not have a teacher to teach them. This is going to impact on their ability to get the score they need to go to university – and it has a further effect as well. Last week I was visiting the member for South-West Coast’s electorate visiting schools across Portland and Warrnambool, and what was very clear from those discussions with principals in regional areas was the fact that these schools cannot find teachers to fill particularly STEM classes but VCE classes in science and maths. We know that these students require these classes and these VCE subjects to be able to access courses in university. In many cases they are prerequisites for certain courses. And these schools, while they would have demand to run them, simply cannot find teachers to do so.

What the teacher crisis is doing is putting greater burden on the existing teacher workforce. As one school principal said to me, ‘We don’t have a teacher shortage, we have a teacher exodus, because people in the profession are working in conditions that are so appalling that they are choosing to leave the profession.’ We heard from the minister just before that the government is investing in initiatives ‍– in fact that hundreds of millions of dollars are being put into these initiatives to attract teachers to the regions in particular – but when you talk to these school principals, they will be the first to tell you that it is simply not working. It is not having the effect, and a consequence of that is looking at how this taxpayer money is being wasted on programs that are not doing anything to improve our teaching workforce.

The other issue here is around the refusal of this government to release the latest teacher supply and demand report. Just today I got a response from the minister about this report saying that it cannot be released because the time line does not line up. But we know that the last report released, the 2021 report, was in fact ready for release before the election in 2022. Of course it was not released at that time, but it was due to be released in October 2022. We are waiting now on the release of the 2022 report. The teacher supply and demand report is incredibly important for solving our teacher shortage crisis because it provides the deep analysis and the projections for the next five years. It looks at the workforce challenges and looks at potential solutions. But this government refuse to release the updated report, that 2022 report – we are coming up to the time now for the 2023 report to be released ‍– because they know the true state is something they do not want to reveal to Victorians.

The key other issue I want to raise today is the declining learning outcomes right across the board from Victorian schools. The government and the minister like to talk about the fact that there are record results; they are incredibly proud of the NAPLAN results. But if you look at NAPLAN for 2023, it shows that nearly one-third of Victorian students are failing to meet proficiency standards around literacy and numeracy. One-third of Victorian students are failing to meet those standards. I am not sure how we can be proud of results when we have got a third of Victorian students failing to meet the foundational skills required as part of their education. If you look to the international results, the Programme for International Student Assessment 2022 results show that half of Victorian students are now not achieving a proficient standard in mathematics. Mathematics is a skill, as we know, that will be increasingly important as we look to the jobs of the future. But concerningly the results of PISA also show disproportionately poor results from Victoria’s most disadvantaged students, with 45 per cent of Victorian students from disadvantaged backgrounds being low performers in mathematics.

Just two weeks ago I joined with the Minister for Education at the launch of the Melbourne Catholic Archdiocese Schools’ new approach to teaching and learning, which explicitly embraces direct instruction and evidence-based teaching across learning methods and of course phonics. On this side of the house we have been prepared and ready to embrace phonics for years, but we have a government, a Labor government, that has a phonics phobia and has even blocked the release of the taxpayer-funded report conducted by La Trobe University that demonstrated positive results from the introduction of phonics in a number of government primary schools. These were positive results that lifted learning outcomes, but the government is refusing to release that report.

Just a couple of weeks ago the Grattan Institute released a report highlighting the importance of adopting evidence-based learning, and as part of this report they demonstrated how the Allan government is lagging behind other jurisdictions, particularly how it ‘muddies the water’ of different approaches when it comes to teaching methods. This choose-your-own-adventure approach by the government is resulting in nearly one-third of Victorian students not being able to read.

Whether it is the state of our schools, the maintenance of our schools, the teacher shortage crisis that is crippling our education system and seeing learning outcomes decline or the lack of will from this government when it comes to introducing evidence-based learning, the Education State could not be further from the truth in this state.

Darren CHEESEMAN (South Barwon) (16:31): It is with some pleasure this afternoon that I rise to make my contribution on all of the investments that the Allan Labor government is making with respect to Victoria’s education system, and I must say, in my time in this place listening to the contributions of Labor members, I could not be prouder of what Labor does when it is given that great opportunity to be in government in the state of Victoria.

It is simply not good enough to say one thing when you are in opposition and to do something completely different when you are in government. With Labor, our approach has always been: no matter where you live in the state of Victoria, whether you live in our great regions, in our rural communities, in the outer suburbs, in the middle suburbs or in our fantastic regional cities, every single Victorian deserves the best possible education, and the reason why we believe that is because every single child in Victoria deserves the very, very best. We want to make sure that every single Victorian from cradle to grave gets the greatest opportunity that they can to have a rich and fulfilled life, and the absolute fundamental tenet for that to happen is to have access to a quality education. That is why we are making those investments in our kinders right across our state. That is why we are introducing free kinder. That is why we are introducing three-year-old kinder, because fundamentally that investment up-front, early in a child’s development, is so critical for their future.

It is also why we are making a massive investment in our growth corridors across Melbourne and regional Victoria. That is why we have set an ambitious target of opening 100 new schools, and I was very pleased to see our active Minister for Education out and about opening 14 new schools this year alone, building on Labor’s record of achievement with respect to these new schools that we are building. We are doing that because every single Victorian deserves access to a quality government school. That is why we are making these investments in our regional growth corridors, and we will continue to strive and continue to make those investments to make sure Victoria’s public schools are fantastic. But also we recognise that with the ambition that we have in this state to grow our economy and to create jobs, we need to make sure that Victorians have the right set of skills available to be able to participate in Labor’s Big Build. That is why we reversed those insidious cuts made by the Liberals when they were last in government with respect to our fantastic TAFEs.

I am someone who is so pleased with the investments we have made in our TAFE system, where we have had to reopen TAFEs closed by the Liberals when they were last in government. That is why we have got free TAFE training, to make sure we are providing the skills that young people need for the jobs our economy needs. We recognise the importance of that because we want to see every single Victorian with the skills our economy needs, and we will continue to build on these programs as our state continues to grow and develop. We also recognise, no matter where you work as a teacher – whether it be in a kinder setting, whether it be in a school setting or a TAFE setting – the importance of those men and women working in that space as teachers, and that is why we are investing to make sure we have got the very best teachers available for people across Victoria, and we will continue to make those investments to recruit, to train and to have the very best teachers that we can. Education is a great enabler. It is so important from our perspective that we make these great investments.

When we reflect of course on our record of achievement, the things that we do when we are given that great opportunity to be in government, we need to look at what the coalition do when they are given the opportunity of being in government. It does not matter what decade you look at, whether it be the 1990s or whether it be that period between 2010 and 2014, at every opportunity, when the coalition are given that great gift of government, they go after our public education institutions – they close our schools and they go after teachers. That is what they do when they are given that great opportunity to be in government. We will always make investments into our public schools, into our kinders and into our TAFE programs because we recognise and value them. Whenever we see the coalition in government, they go after our public education institutions to favour those elitist private schools often found in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne. We will continue to make these investments. We will continue to make sure every single Victorian, no matter where they live, gets the opportunity to access a great education – a great public education – with great schools, great teachers and supportive communities. We want to make sure that we give every single Victorian from three years of age right through to completing TAFE or going on to university every single opportunity that we can.

When I was thinking about it in the lead-up to the 2022 election I thought, ‘Jeez, we’ve done a lot.’ We have made a lot of investments, we are building a lot of schools, we are doing some fantastic work in the TAFE space, we are doing some fantastic work in the kinder space and we are providing every single Victorian more opportunities. I thought to myself, ‘What more could we do?’ What possible things could we come up with to continue to build on our record of achievement? I knew what I was going to campaign for in my local community, but I very much thought what more could we do. What I was very pleased to see is that we recognised in some parts of Victoria a childcare drought where some people, because of the community that they live in, are not being provided that opportunity. Very pleasingly and very surprisingly to me we made that investment. We made the announcement that we were going to end the childcare drought in those areas by making an investment, and that is what we are doing.

We are making those investments. We are stepping into a space that historically governments across Australia have not made that investment in. We are pushing the boundaries, and the reason why we are pushing those boundaries is because every single Victorian deserves the very, very best opportunities.

In my seat, the seat of South Barwon, Geelong’s growth corridor, I can see in school after school record investment where we are building quality buildings, we are building quality schools and we are making those investments to ensure that every child in my electorate and every child across the state of Victoria gets the very, very best access to a quality education. I could not be prouder of the investments Labor make when we are in government, and it is in stark contrast to what the coalition do every single time that they are given that great gift of government, which is chaos, cuts, closures – it is taking the back of a meat axe to our very proud schools.

Annabelle CLEELAND (Euroa) (16:41): I am pleased to rise today and speak on this matter of public importance submitted by the member for Niddrie, which boasts about the work the Allan Labor government is doing in the education sector. It is lovely to follow the latest contribution about pushing boundaries, because I think I will give you an explanation of the boundaries that this government is really pushing. While it is not an attempt to be self-indulgent, this MPI is an attempt to pat the government on the back. But I must give Labor a healthy dose of reality.

Within my electorate is Kilmore, the largest town in Victoria without a public secondary school, located in one of the biggest growth corridors in the state. The only secondary school option currently in Kilmore is Assumption College, a private school that has fees starting from nearly $9000 a year. Assumption is an outstanding school, because it did produce one of my fabulous staff members and digital wizards; however, not everyone in Kilmore has the opportunity to attend private school. Down the road in Broadford and Wallan the schools are already at or very nearing capacity, and students as young as 12 years old are having to make a 2-hour commute to and from school each day. The need for a school in Kilmore has been repeatedly brought to this government’s attention, yet it has been ignored every time.

There was a golden opportunity just missed due to a lack of urgency and care from this government and from the former Minister for Education. Despite thousands of local residents signing petitions calling for the state government to purchase the former Colmont School campus, it was instead sold privately. The previous Minister for Education was made aware of this opportunity on multiple occasions and was invited to meet with local families to hear how desperately they needed this school. Instead she did nothing, demonstrating a short-sightedness and arrogance that has resulted in hundreds of families being left without reasonable local education options. This former school campus was ready-made and conveniently on the market, and it had the opportunity to provide a cost-effective solution to this very real problem for our community. So I ask: why should these children be placed at such a disadvantage just because of where they live? This is not some rural, remote location; this is Kilmore, one of the fastest growing towns in our state. It is time to listen to the community and provide them with a public school.

I have some direct quotes from Kilmore residents who have signed the petition. There are nearly 3500 signatures, so I think I will just give you a couple of those comments. Rachel Fairman said:

… family’s and children should not have to suffer exhaustion to gain an education …

Jamie Leahy said:

I have 3 kids who will all need a high school to go to soon. I shouldn’t have to bus them out of town so they can get the education they deserve!

Meghan Thorpe said:

I have 2 children that will be attending high school in the next few years my husband and I can’t afford a private school and don’t want to travel really far away …

Margaret Kelly said:

There is an empty school, you don’t have a school, yet somehow the government is not joining the dots!

Tracey Challis said:

The amount of housing getting built in the area, the growth of the township and surrounding areas, there is definitely enough families to warrant a public highschool … A town this size and only offering a private school is just wrong. There has been talks and petitions –

but –

… This has been needed for several years … It’s about time the government listened.

Rebecca Hocking said:

We need more options for public high schools in the area, having a public high school option for Kilmore will relieve commuting stress factors and make schools more accessible.

Families in Kilmore should not be forced into paying for a private school as their only option within town or having to commute to a completely different town just so their child can receive an education. I think everyone in this chamber can agree that everyone deserves an education close to home. These are just a handful of the thousands of responses received, nearly 3500 signatures, all of which agree that this Labor government has let them down when it comes to finding reasonable education for their children. We could fill a school tomorrow in Kilmore, yet I have got nothing but crickets out of this government, who is bold enough to brag about its education investments. How can this government pat themselves on the back about their contributions to education while this goes on?

Unfortunately, Kilmore is not the only part of my electorate desperately campaigning for a public school. I want to thank Shayne Swansborough for his recent work pushing for a public secondary school in Heathcote, another community with a significant population to warrant a secondary school. With two primary schools in the town, Heathcote sees seven busloads of secondary school children depart every morning for trips between 45 minutes to 1 hour each way. Most children on these buses are now required to leave home by 7:30 am and will not get home until nearly 5 pm. With a secondary school in Heathcote, the children would save 2 hours a day in travel. On top of this, we have issues at schools in Tooborac, issues electorate-wide with students unable to access free school bus routes, road safety issues at Colbinabbin Primary School and concerns over school crossing supervisors in both the Strathbogie shire and in Heathcote.

Funding debates continue between our local councils and the state government over who will adequately fund the school crossing supervisor program, leaving our children incredibly vulnerable in the meantime. The program was previously fully funded through the department of transport, with the percentage contribution from the Victorian government rapidly declining in recent years and cost shifting to local councils. This is a matter of utmost importance to our local community that has to be resolved and is genuinely putting children’s lives on the line until it is resolved. Conversations I have had with community members have made it clear that this is something worth fighting for, and I stand with them. We will not stop fighting until our children are safe. Calls for the supervisors to be reinstated have hit fever pitch following a near miss of a collision by a speeding vehicle at a school crossing. Despite Nagambie Primary School principal Rob French wearing a hi-vis vest and holding a stop sign, this speeding car nearly hit him. If it had been a child crossing the road unsupervised, then there is no doubt this could have been a horrific ending. It is concerning that there has been a lack of urgency in ensuring the safety of our children at school crossings by this government.

Another point I must raise is the state of child care in Victoria, particularly in regional Victoria. As things currently stand, regional Victoria is in dire need of more childcare centres, because you are right: we are riddled with childcare deserts. Kilmore, Broadford, the Benalla region and the Seymour region are all classified as childcare deserts by the Mitchell Institute. Waitlists in many towns in my electorate are now up to two years long. In Seymour we have an eight-baby capacity in a childcare centre and an 80-strong waitlist. We have got incredible local childcare providers, but in most of these places there are up to six kids competing for one place. It is not sustainable. These are major towns, but they are being placed at a disadvantage when child care is so rare. The lack of childcare options is placing a significant barrier on young people who want to raise their family in regional Victoria. Towns like Nagambie and Avenel were not included in the new childcare facility announcement, despite serious problems finding local childcare in these areas.

While we have seen the announcement of 50 new childcare early learning centres that will be established across the state, the issues persist with the rollout. As part of the government’s plan for new early learning centres I was pleased that Seymour, located in my electorate. was included to alleviate some of the strain on the system locally. But our community is now angry about this misleading announcement. The reality is that it will not be delivered until beyond 2028, if it is delivered at all, and it is an absolute slap in the face to parents not wanting but needing to return to work.

This headline-grabbing announcement has prevented private providers and not-for-profits from filling the childcare void, yet this government has no goal to actually deliver and relieve childcare centres. The Allan Labor government is simply not prepared to fix the childcare crisis, and in many cases it could be argued that it is compounding the crisis with the slow rollout of centres. We are already seeing a scramble by this government to find ways to deliver yet another program they have announced without a suitable or thought-out plan.

In 2023 the Australian Childcare Alliance surveyed over 600 childcare centres, with over two-thirds responding by saying they had capped enrolments due to staffing shortages. As a result 16,000 ‍childcare places lay dormant due to the workforce crisis. Disruptions and distortions to the market could result in a significant reduction in the number of childcare places. The government estimates it would need 700 educators and 100 teachers and support staff. The hundreds of staff will need to be ready to go in these centres from day one. Simply put, this government has not earned the right to boast about its contributions to education.

Michaela SETTLE (Eureka) (16:51): I am delighted to rise to speak on this matter of public importance, though I do wonder if those on the other side live in a different reality. Everyone that I speak to and know absolutely acknowledges the extraordinary work that this government has done in education. It is not just a number plate, it is something people say: Victoria is the Education State, showing in our NAPLAN and showing in our young people. It is an extraordinary accomplishment. The great Gough Whitlam of course said:

We are all diminished when any of us are denied proper education. The nation is the poorer – a poorer economy, a poorer national civilisation, because of this national human waste.

The wonderful Gough Whitlam knew then that we need to bring everybody along with us. I have been delighted to listen to extraordinary contributions from our wonderful Deputy Premier and of course my friend and colleague the member for South Barwon about the many things that we have done.

But there is a particularly personal piece for me, which is around what this government has done for TAFE. As many people in this room know, I am a TAFE alumna. It literally changed my life. I was trying to find a new career. I was not confident enough to go off to university, so I started a TAFE degree and it created a pathway. I went through and did my diploma, then I did my BA and then I did a master of politics, and here I am today. So TAFE is really close to my heart, and it is something that this government has done an extraordinary job on. Sadly, when I started my TAFE course it was under the previous Liberal government, and it was a pretty awful time for anyone who was engaged with TAFE.

A member interjected.

Michaela SETTLE: Really dark days. They absolutely gutted the TAFE system. They took over a billion dollars out of TAFE. They shut 22 TAFE campuses, padlocking Lilydale, shutting down Greensborough. They should be ashamed, because TAFE is for everybody, and this government has always looked to help everyone in the community. We have a minister in the other place, the Minister for Skills and TAFE, and I have never met a more passionate minister. She has been in that role since 2016, and I think she has quite literally transformed TAFE. It has been extraordinary. I can remember the minister saying to me very early on that she was adamant that vocational education was the equal of higher education and she would not stop until people realised that reality, and we have got there.

But of course what is extraordinary about both that minister and this government is that they did not stop there. Not only did we go to rebuild TAFE, but we then looked at free TAFE. Free TAFE is an extraordinary service that we have done for people in our community. This week marks five years, so a big happy birthday to free TAFE. It has made some really, really fundamental changes in our system. In Ballarat we have the Fed Uni TAFE of course, and I was just talking to the provost of the TAFE – he is the director of the TAFE and the provost of the uni. And in 2024 they now have record enrolments. They have never had enrolments as high as this. Some of that has been generated of course more recently by free TAFE but also just by the fact that this government and this minister have put so much effort into rebuilding TAFE. In Ballarat between 2019 and 2023 we had 4171 enrolments. That is a pretty extraordinary number of people that have now been able to go out and get a TAFE education.

But of course these are just numbers, and I think it is really important to remember that behind these numbers are people – very real people. Now, I was delighted to visit the Ballarat Base Hospital with my colleagues from Ripon and Wendouree and the wonderful Minister for Health a week ago. It was really interesting because we rode the lift up to the top of the building site and there was a wonderful young woman called Sam. She was the site manager, and she had done a free TAFE course to get there, to become that site manager. We get to the top and we meet another young woman. Well, she was on her second day of work. She had previously worked in hospitality. She was in her early 30s and decided that she wanted to do something more, and she enrolled in a free TAFE course. She is now an enrolled nurse. So it is not just the numbers; you are surrounded by people that have had their lives changed. And you might notice something in those two examples: they were both women. That is what free TAFE for me has really changed, because it has been women that have been able to pick it up. It has really made a difference to women who wanted to re-enter the workforce. That is why I went to TAFE. Thankfully, I was okay with it, but a lot of women have to make that choice – do I retrain, can I afford to retrain, or do I need to just stay at home and look after the kids because I cannot afford to retrain? What free TAFE has meant is that so many people have now been able to go on and further their career.

Just last Friday I was at the Fed Uni TAFE excellence awards, and there were 250 graduating students. Now, they were not all from free TAFE, but they were certainly alumni of this extraordinary system that this government has rebuilt – this system that those on the other side did not think was worth funding. They had no respect. They have never had respect for working people, and they have never understood that we need to support people in trades and that vocational training is absolutely the equal of higher education.

When I was speaking to the provost recently, he said that the impacts of free TAFE have really been very broad and that what he loves about this program is that it is regionally assessed and also nimble. He described a situation where they had been advocating to the government about adding a free TAFE course, and indeed that has now happened. This government listened, and there is now a cert III in training and assessment. And he told me that that is one of the highest enrolments that they have. Of course what that means is that there will be more free TAFE teachers. The other thing that he pointed out was just the sort of general wellbeing and mental health of their students since free TAFE came along. You know, a lot of people have to sit there and wonder in the time of a cost-of-living crisis whether they can afford to continue their education, and of course free TAFE means that they absolutely can.

Since 2014 this government has absolutely rebuilt TAFE, and free TAFE has been an extraordinary success. More than 156,000 students in Victoria have gone through free TAFE, saving them $432 million in fees. It has changed lives for people. It has changed workforces for people. And as I say, a goodly proportion of the 156,000 – 87,000 of them – were women who could go and retrain and re-enter the workforce. It has been an extraordinary success.

I would like to acknowledge again the minister in the other place. I have known her for many years. She has been in the portfolio since 2016, and she has not wasted a day. She rebuilt TAFE and then just kept going, introducing free TAFE. It has been such a life changer for so many people, and I include in that myself. I retrained, I found the confidence and I went back into the workforce after having been at home as a stay-at-home mum. The Deputy Premier did steal my other quote, which is of course: ‘Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.’ That was the wonderful Nelson Mandela. This government is all about changing the world for the better. We know the importance of education. We have invested in education, and lifelong learning has been so utterly important. Those on the other side have never respected TAFE. They utterly, utterly gutted it in their last iteration, and it was a shame, and we have worked long and hard to build it. People like the provost at Fed Uni will tell you that now they have record enrolments, because this government respects TAFE.

Nicole WERNER (Warrandyte) (17:01): I rise to speak on the matter of public importance, which goes to the heart of the question of whether Victoria is the Education State. Let me start by putting on the record that education is an issue that is close to my heart. As I did share in my maiden speech, I come from a family history where my maternal grandmother is – to this day at 90 years old – still illiterate because of the poverty that she grew up in. In two generations we have been able to come from this place of poverty and illiteracy in my family to me being the member for Warrandyte here in Melbourne. That is a wonderful thing. I do know – it is a lived experience of my family – that education breaks the poverty cycle. I want to put that on record.

I want to put on record as well that it is an issue close to my heart because I am the first in my family to graduate from university. As a consequence of the sacrifices of my grandmother and of my parents, that was something that I was able to achieve for our family, and that is something that I think is fantastic. To that point I would also like to shout out to all our brilliant educators. We love teachers here on this side of the house. We truly do. My mum, who came from an illiterate mother herself, was able to become a teacher in Malaysia when she graduated from teachers college in Malacca, Malaysia. That is my mum. My sister-in-law as well is a brilliant teacher in the member for Euroa’s patch. She is just brilliant. So I wanted to put that on record, as well as to say that we have wonderful and amazing schools in my electorate.

One of my favourite parts of the job is to actually get out to these schools and spend time with students, spend time with these educators and spend time in school communities, but if we are to be the Education State we must ensure that our schools have the best facilities and opportunities so that our students can succeed. I would like to put some questions to the minister on the record, and I will detail them one by one in the time that I have.

At Andersons Creek Primary School there is a new principal, Daniel Webber. He has been doing a fantastic job. I saw him just recently, on Sunday morning, at Run Warrandyte. He was involved in it himself personally as well as getting students from the school involved. It is a great community initiative fundraising for our local sports clubs. What I would like to know about Andersons Creek Primary School, what I would like to ask the minister, is whether there are plans to upgrade the old Andersons Creek Primary School playground, which is in dire need of financial assistance.

Then we have got a school in my electorate, Ringwood North Primary School, with principal Ken Chatterton. Just last year they celebrated their 100-year anniversary. I was privileged to be there with them on that day. That weekend they also had their school fair. Ringwood North Primary School’s current 200-seat stadium is too small for a school of 432 students. They simply do not fit, so I ask the minister whether there are plans to upgrade this stadium.

Then there is Chirnside Park Primary School in my electorate – it was formerly in the member for Evelyn’s until there was a state redistribution. I was there at a leadership assembly a few weeks ago. The principal Graham Elliott – again, a fantastic school principal – articulated to me that there is no indoor gym space and school assemblies have to be held outside. I ask the minister: when will you address this issue? I also ask the minister: given that there was funding given to the school in 2020 to upgrade the school oval, why is it that four years later there still has not been an upgrade to the oval?

Finally, we have Donburn Primary School, another fantastic school in my electorate, with an excellent leadership team at the helm of principal Julie Hoskin and assistant principals Jarod Ryan, Jess Bullen and Sue Fuller. I had a wonderful time visiting there last week going from class to class. Chinese is their language at this school in Donvale, and I was privileged to pay a visit to one of the Chinese classes. I got to indulge in some of my conversational Mandarin, and it was fantastic – great to be able to do. In 2017 they had a master plan come through, and they are still waiting for the next stage of building classrooms. Their portable classrooms have significant issues and the cost to upkeep them is skyrocketing. I ask the minister: when will the government be taking the next step in building these new classrooms? This is just to name a few schools in my electorate that I have visited in my first six months as the new member for Warrandyte. I will continue to be a vocal advocate for our local schools and for our community.

Now to the question at hand: the Allan Labor government calling Victoria the Education State. I wonder how that can be when there are situations and stories that we hear of like toxic mould in primary schools that is making our primary school students sick – primary school students at a state school. At Balnarring Primary School, in the electorate of the member for Hastings, who has actually left the chamber now, there are primary students who have been exposed to toxic mould, with parents expressing concerns about their children’s health and disruptions to learning. How can we call ourselves the Education State when the parents are saying that their kids have respiratory illnesses, including asthma, and a series of other health issues amid this serious mould problem?

This is an issue that is close to my heart because we have also had similar problems at Heatherwood School in my electorate. Heatherwood School is in Donvale, in my electorate, and it is an amazing school which endeavours to give young people with learning disabilities the same educational opportunities as anyone else. On the day of my by-election there was a fire that occurred at the school, and that only served to exacerbate the fact that the builder had fallen through in May 2023. Then in August the Herald Sun reported that Heatherwood School was enveloped in black poisonous mould. We have a disability school in my electorate that is in enveloped in poisonous black mould – and we call ourselves the Education State. I had the parents writing to me from this school, and this is what they said to me:

The apparent lack of effort in pushing the Victorian School Building Authority to secure a builder for Heatherwood School not only raises serious concerns but also gives us the impression of discrimination against a vulnerable community.

That is a quote directly from a parent.

It is disheartening that our repeated attempts to communicate our urgent needs and concerns have gone unanswered, leaving us feeling unheard and marginalised. The delay in putting our building works to tender until September has left our community questioning why our children, who are equally deserving of quality education facilities, seem to be treated differently. We believe that every child’s potential deserves equal attention and support. The delay in addressing our situation only deepens the sense of discrimination.

This is from one of the parents of this school, so how can we call ourselves the Education State? Another parent at this school wrote to me describing how her 16-year-old son was in fear of using the toilets. She says:

They are located far from the classroom, and if he goes during class time there’s no teacher available to supervise. He’s been locked in the portable toilets on several occasions by bullies. The trauma of the noises, the smells, is too much for him. My other son holds on, and when he comes home he is busting to use the toilet. He sits on a bus for 90 minutes on the way home from school.

Another parent wrote to me that it was such a scary place for her son to actually go to the toilets that sometimes he would come home – and I remind you again this is a school that supports students with a disability – with soiled clothing because he could not use this toilet that the Allan Labor government failed to actually renovate despite it being in this dire state.

I ask how the Allan Labor government can claim to be the Education State when the statistics are so shocking: a Grattan Institute report recently said that around one in four Victorian school students are not proficient at reading. In my professional life as a youth worker I saw this firsthand – that there were vulnerable young people who could not read or write, who had been failed by our education system, who ended up disengaging with school, falling into youth gangs and, sadly, being incarcerated and falling into a life of criminality. We need to do better for these students; we need to do better for our young people.

Finally, I know that the Minister for Education did note this, but I would like to set the record straight that under Labor teacher shortages have actually exploded. There are nearly 800 teaching and classroom support roles currently vacant across the state, and Labor’s teacher shortage crisis will continue to deny students the high-quality education they deserve, with nine in 10 government school principals declaring teacher shortages. I do not know how we can call ourselves the Education State. So finally, the case is clear: the spin, it is unashamed. I have laid it out so plainly: firstly, toxic mould making kids sick in our schools; secondly, toilets in such dire need of repair that students with a disability avoid the toilets and go home with soiled pants; thirdly, one in four students in Victoria cannot read; and fourthly, teacher shortages have exploded. Do not believe the spin – this is not the Education State.

Daniela DE MARTINO (Monbulk) (17:11): I rise today with great pride in support of this matter of public importance. Ten minutes is simply not long enough for me to talk about and do justice to all of the incredible work that the Allan Labor government has done in ensuring that Victoria is indeed the Education State. I would like to acknowledge, first and foremost, my dear friend the former member for Monbulk and education minister the Honourable James Merlino, who led the charge on a great series of reforms in his time as minister from December 2014 until June 2022, and which the Allan Labor government and our new Minister for Education continue to champion and enhance.

The work our government has undertaken to enhance opportunities – from our littlest learners to adults retraining and upskilling – is exceptional and is absolutely something to be very proud of. I am incredibly excited to also see what will come, because the future looks very bright indeed for learners of all ages and stages of life under our government. As a former teacher, it is not an overstatement to say that I am incredibly passionate about education in all of its forms. From early learning through to post-secondary studies, from the academic and theoretical to the hands-on technical and practical, education is the door through which all things are achievable. Malcolm X stated that it was the ‘passport to the future’. It is the great leveller, and good governments who wish to see their people thrive and live decent lives believe in education. They invest in education, and that is precisely what the Allan Labor government has done and continues to do for the state of Victoria. I am an incredibly proud member of this government, which has made it abundantly clear over the past nine years that it is committed to the education of all Victorians, because we know that high-quality education and an abundance of it leads to better outcomes for everyone and our society more broadly.

We have invested significantly in education, and the statistics are quite stark; I will come to them a bit later. But in my electorate alone, two of our major state secondary schools have been practically rebuilt and another is soon to receive a significant upgrade. You would not actually recognise Upwey High School from a satellite image nowadays, with the significant capital works which have occurred over the past few years. It has transformed an old, crumbling school into a state-of-the-art learning facility fit for Victorian students, where they can achieve their very best. The story is the same at Monbulk College. Starting in 2015, the upgrading and modernising of this excellent local school was completed not long ago, and we have completely transformed that one as well. At the end of 2022, stage 1 of a refurbishment of Emerald Secondary College was completed. The new food technology rooms and textile rooms are something to behold, and the staff and admin building is a place and space fit for great teachers. I am delighted we are actually going to be investing another $8.77 million to continue the modernisation upgrade of this college, continuing the school’s master plan. The architect has been appointed – I was there for that moment, it was wonderful – and the design is underway. I cannot wait to see it.

Thousands of students across this state are learning in more modern classrooms, science labs and libraries and using better facilities at schools like gyms, sports ovals and music rooms. These facilities make a difference because children need places to play, to kick a ball or throw it or to perform a song. They need classrooms which facilitate their learning – the science labs; the food technology rooms; the graphic design, the art and the woodworking rooms; and the list goes on. Teachers can teach under a tree, but to really teach well it helps when the environment is great too.

When it comes to education, we do have an incredible track record to be proud of no matter what others may say. Back in the early 2000s I taught in the state and independent school systems and my actual schooling was across the Catholic system, so I think I have got a fair appreciation for the cross-section of the different schooling systems in our state. Our state schools, back even in the early 2000s, were still in a recovery phase post the shock of having to exist through the Kennett era of the 1990s. That was a time when 350 state schools were closed by that government, and approximately 8000 ‍teachers were sacked. It was a dark time for education in Victoria. Some teachers still recount the trauma of not being paid for months during that era. No money came into their bank accounts from the state government. It was appalling. Fancy that – 350 schools closed. Horrendous. To see where we have arrived at now it is important to look at the context of the past. It gives us an even greater appreciation for the state of education now since Labor governments have come to power and not only repaired the damage of the past but built on and improved our education system to bring it to where it is today. It is absolutely in stark contrast to the dark times of the seven years of the Kennett era. We have invested $4.9 billion through the Victorian budget in the last budget alone.

Paul Edbrooke: How much?

Daniela DE MARTINO: $4.9 billion, member for Frankston. It is a considerable sum in one Victorian budget. As part of that budget the Victorian government allocated just under $356 million for upgrading and modernising projects at 47 schools across the state. $272.97 million has been allocated to deliver upgrades at 34 metro schools, and $82.87 million has been allocated to deliver upgrades at 13 regional schools.

I am very fortunate that in my electorate there are 26 great state schools. We have been upgrading and modernising so many, which I mentioned before, across our term in government. It is the primary schools as well, which I did not touch on before. Monbulk Primary received a $7 million upgrade and modernisation. It is an old school, which was built in 1887. It looks extraordinary now. It is a great school to go to into the future. And one of our beautiful special development schools, Eastern Ranges School, is also being upgraded along with all the others across the state. I love this school. It is a great school. It was lovely to hear the member for Kew express her appreciation for our special development schools as well. This school is just a particularly great one. Mount Dandenong kinder as well is a great story here. Mount Dandenong kinder was crushed by the trees during the June 2021 storms. The new location for this kindergarten is now on the grounds of the Mount Dandenong Primary School, so that is continuing our policy to ensure that we save the double drop-off wherever we can, so we have this co-located kindergarten. I had the chance to have a walk-through, and I tell you what, it will be exceptional. It is a great story for the community, who had to suffer the loss of their kindergarten through a terrible, terrible circumstance.

Education, as I have stated, absolutely changes lives – from kinder to great local schools all the way through to TAFE. The free TAFE that we have been offering – as the member for Eureka was discussing; I was listening with great interest to her contribution about free TAFE – is not just about ensuring that people can get a form of education because they think it is a nice idea. It is about upskilling and retraining people, especially as the jobs of the future look quite different to how they looked in the past. We have acknowledged that as a government, and we have ensured that people, no matter what their capacity to pay – it does not matter – have free TAFE courses. It absolutely guarantees that people have greater opportunities. They have a greater capacity to make better choices for themselves going forward and in their careers. That is absolutely to be celebrated.

The other thing that is really close to my heart – and I note I have only got a minute and a half left – is the breakfast club program that we are running. I cannot state more clearly how important it is to ensure that children are not hungry when they are trying to learn, because not many people function terribly well on an empty stomach. Back in my days of teaching in the early 2000s there was no breakfast club but there were plenty of kids who turned up who had had no breakfast and had no lunch, and we really did not know if they were going home to much dinner. Teachers used to put their hands in their pockets and they would go and buy those children some food when they noticed. But that was not terribly sustainable, and it certainly was not on a scale like we produce today.

Our 1000 breakfast clubs ensure that every child who attends one gets to start the day the right way. And it is not just breakfast; they also get lunch packs, and some of them get packs to take home as well. It is an incredible innovation of our government to be doing this, because as I said, hungry people do not learn terribly well, and that just entrenches disadvantage even further. If there is one thing that Labor governments do, it is that we ensure wherever we can that our policies enhance and lift those who need a bit of extra help. It does not matter what your bank balance is; your opportunities should be just the same as anyone else’s. I am incredibly proud to be a part of this government, which understands the importance of education and invests in it every day.

Wayne FARNHAM (Narracan) (17:21): I am pleased to rise today on the matter of public importance that Victoria is the Education State, and obviously that is debatable. It is debatable, and that is why we are debating it. It has been interesting. I have been sitting in here since the MPI started. I listened to the minister and I have listened to all the contributions, and it is amazing the amount of pork-barrelling that is going on with the Education State. Everything I have heard that has been delivered has been in Labor seats. Even the 50 new centres that the government wants to build – I think 14 are going to be delivered by 2026 and 11 of those, or 80 per cent, are in Labor seats. I remind the government of their catchcry at the last election, which was ‘We govern for all Victorians’. I think they are missing a few, probably on this side of the chamber from what I have heard today.

I will start with early education, because we all know it is important. I could not agree more with three- ‍and four-year-old kinder; I think it is very, very important for kids to get educated very early. The problem I have with the government’s program, which they announced at the last election which got implemented pretty well straightaway in 2023, is that the government did not give anyone time to get ready for it, and that is a problem we are seeing today. Three-year-old kinder at the moment, in a lot of situations, is being used as child care. And I do not blame the parents. If you would otherwise drop your kid at child care and you can save $300 a week by taking them to three-year-old kinder, fair enough, because we know the cost of living is out of control and we know life is hard for people under Labor.

But this is what has happened in my electorate because of this government’s rush to push this through, and I think the government should have planned this better. I have a centre called Grace Berglund. Grace Berglund was built in 1973, and it was funded – and I know this language might be a little bit off-putting today but it was called this back then – and built by the spastic society for disabled adults. That happened in 1973. It has now been renamed Scope, thank goodness, because the other name was not too flattering. What is happening now is, probably as an unintended consequence of three-year-old kinder with my council trying to keep up with the new government regulation, I have 27 disabled adults getting kicked to the kerb with nowhere to go.

To be honest, there are two parts to the blame here. One, I blame my local council, and the other blame I put on government because they did not give people time. If they had have had time, councils could have kept up with this, but 27 disabled adults getting kicked to the kerb from a facility they have been in for 50 years is absolutely disgraceful. I am going to take this opportunity now to say to the Baw Baw shire do not put your hand up on this; do not be the councillor that puts your hand up to kick a disabled person to the kerb with nowhere to go. Some of these disabled adults are 35 years old – they have been there a lifetime. It is their comfort zone. So I am saying this on the record: unfortunately, drop three-year-old kinder at this time at this facility because at no point in time should we be kicking disabled people to the kerb with nowhere to go.

But I will go on to learning and what is happening in my electorate. The government claims to be an Education State – that is what they are claiming – but I am not seeing it where I live. I am really not. Last year many in this chamber would have heard me talk about Neerim primary school. We actually tabled a petition last sitting week I believe on Neerim primary school. I did have a meeting with department heads and the chief of staff of the minister as well, and they promised me a meeting for residents of Neerim on the primary school, which is due for closure, but there still has been no meeting. That is disappointing, because I actually took the minister on his word, I took the department on their word, and it has not happened. I have so many schools in my area. I will talk about Drouin Primary School, and I will talk about this school because the government are investing in Drouin Primary School, okay? Great – I appreciate it; we need the investment. The problem is, though, that in the last 50 years the only new government school that has been built in my area is the Warragul specialist school, which I had the pleasure of building myself. And I will say Lynne –

A member interjected.

Wayne FARNHAM: It was a great job, and it was without a doubt one of the most rewarding projects I have ever done. Lynne Kosky was the minister back then, and she was a wonderful lady too, just quietly. I met her, and she was a wonderful lady. But in my electorate in the last 50 years there has been just one new school: Warragul specialist school. The government is investing $20-odd million in refurbishing Drouin Primary School – and it needs it, no doubt there – but the problem we have got is we need new schools. We do not need a refurbishment. It is not going to add extra students. For more money – there is land that is annexed for a primary school – they could have built a new one. Drouin Primary School is in the centre of town and landlocked, and traffic is horrendous. It takes you 20 minutes to get through Drouin at school time. It is only a kilometre long – 20 minutes. And we need other investment in my area.

Labertouche Primary School has a great principal; she does a fantastic job. She has taken this school from 33 students in three years to 66 students and up to 83 students but cannot get a portable building. If you are going to govern for all Victorians like you said you were going to at the last election, stop pork-barrelling and look to other areas that actually really do need investment, because we are getting very little investment in Narracan. In Labertouche we have got a very, very successful principal doing a great job. We know there are portables out there. We see them on the road to Bendigo, up the Calder Highway; we see them on the road sitting there. Please put a portable in so they have got more room. We love our teachers, but at the moment they have got no staffroom. They have no staffroom because of the lack of investment in these regional schools.

Then I was down this week at Yarragon Primary School, another school I built, by the way; I will just put that in there. I built Yarragon Primary School back in 2011. But that school is nearly at capacity and needs to expand, and it does not look like there is any investment there. Even car parking is an issue.

Then I have got Nilma Primary School: same problem – full, no car parking. So the government is telling me this is the Education State, but I think the government is picking and choosing where it wants to invest, and I do not think that is fair. Victorians took government at their word. The government said, ‘We will govern for all Victorians,’ so I am calling on the government to back that up. I am calling on the government to do what matters and govern for all Victorians in my electorate, because at the moment it is not happening. I was down at Trafalgar last week. That school is near capacity, with sporting facilities that they cannot play sport on. That local community actually cohabits; the local community uses that school as well. They are in desperate need of upgrades as well.

We have to look beyond city-centric Melbourne, we have to look beyond Labor electorates and we have to look at coalition electorates that are in great need. I have said this in this chamber before: I live in one of the fastest growing areas in Victoria, and I would like the government to start to take notice. I do appreciate that the government is going to build one of their 50 centres in my electorate in 2028, which is a long way away for a region that is experiencing such growth, but as far as the MPI goes, that we are the Education State – well, you are falling very short in my electorate.

Ella GEORGE (Lara) (17:31): I am delighted to rise today to speak on this matter of public importance that this house notes that Victoria is the Education State, with the Allan Labor government implementing a range of policies to ensure all students get the best start in life, because Victoria is the Education State and it is always a pleasure to speak about education in this house. I will start my contribution today with a shout-out to my mum, who spent her entire career teaching in public schools. She was such a great teacher that on many occasions I wished she was my own teacher too.

There are a number of significant education upgrades taking place in the electorate of Lara, and with my time today I would like to highlight three of these that the Allan Labor government has made investments in. Western Heights College in Hamlyn Heights has an incredible specialist sports program, providing a unique opportunity for student athletes to pursue their passion for sports while receiving a quality education. Students can take part in specialist programs in AFL, basketball, netball and soccer. Additionally, these programs offer students valuable insights into career pathways in sports-related industries. But despite this program, students at Western Heights do not have an onsite gym and instead have had to use an old gym from their former campus or hire other community facilities. I acknowledge the Western Heights community, which has been advocating for the construction of a gym on campus for many years. All this will change for Western Heights thanks to this government. Last year’s budget, which included $2 billion for Victorian schools, included $7.55 million to build a competition-grade gym onsite. It is a great development for the students and the college as a whole and one that I know is very exciting for local students and their families. Architects have been appointed and designs are underway. The site is cleared and ready to go, and it will be a fantastic community asset for years to come.

Northern Bay College and its five campuses are an integral part of the Corio and Norlane communities. Members may not know that Norlane is Victoria’s most disadvantaged suburb and Corio is ranked eighth on that list. Rankings like these make public education and all of the supports that wrap around our students like breakfast clubs and the Smile Squad all the more important. The educational landscape of Corio and Norlane has been transformed over the last 15 years, with Northern Bay College being established as part of the Corio–Norlane education regeneration project, a project driven by Labor governments. The project brought together nine local schools to form a prep to year 12 college across five campuses. All four junior campuses, with students from prep to year 8, have been redeveloped, once again thanks to successive investments from Labor state governments. The Goldsworthy campus, which caters to senior students in years 9 to 12, is the last of these five campuses to be redeveloped, and this Labor government has invested $17.2 million into the Goldsworthy campus to deliver a state-of-the-art performing arts centre, a new school entrance, admin buildings and new classrooms. The new facilities are nearly complete and will be ready for students to be learning in from term 2 this year. Northern Bay is a remarkable local school that is making a significant impact in the Corio and Norlane community, and this upgrade in the heart of Corio highlights the importance of education and provides students with a world-class learning environment that will benefit them for years to come.

When it comes to specialist schools, no government has invested more than this Labor government, because we recognise that students with all abilities deserve great education – and that is exactly what students will get in Victoria with great schools and great specialist teachers. As a candidate in the 2022 election I was blown away when I visited Nelson Park School in Corio. I was blown away by the incredible teaching staff, their caring approach to students and of course the wonderful students themselves, who are achieving so much. This Labor government is funding redevelopments at both of Nelson Park’s campuses, with $10 million being invested at their Bell Park campus and $6 million being invested at their Corio campus. And since 2015 under this government, every specialist school has received funding for a major upgrade. In the 2022–23 budget, which included $658 million to upgrade and improve existing schools across Victoria, almost half of this investment – $326 million – was dedicated to upgrades at specialist schools.

Every child deserves the very best start to life, and Victoria leads the nation, as we know, when it comes to early childhood education and care. We have committed $14 billion to expand kindergarten programs across the state under our Best Start, Best Life reforms. This means that every Victorian child can attend kinder for free. This means we will build 50 government owned and operated early learning centres, an ambitious plan to address childcare shortages in the areas of greatest need. The first four of these will open in 2025, followed with 10 more in 2026 and the remaining 36 across 2027 and 2028, meaning that the best start to life is that much closer for so many Victorian children.

Under this government we have made kinder free. The Victorian government’s $270 million free kinder initiative is available to all three- and four-year-olds enrolled in participating kinders, and free kinder will save families up to $2500 in fees per child per year. It provides much-needed relief for family budgets and gives women more choices when it comes to returning to the workforce. In 2023 approximately 97 per cent – or more than 2750 services – of funded kinders participated in free kinder, which benefited up to 140,000 children. We will establish pre-prep over the next decade – a new, universal 30-hour-a-week program of play-based early learning for four-year-old children. And when it comes to schools, we have delivered more than 1300 school upgrades and 70 new school projects across the state, supporting more than 5000 construction jobs for Victorians. This year alone the Deputy Premier has opened 14 new schools with a total capacity of almost 9000 students in our growing suburbs. Ninety-six new schools have now been opened between 2017 and 2024, including 75 schools as a part of our commitment to open 100 new schools between 2019 and 2026.

I mentioned earlier that my mum was a public school teacher. She was an art teacher across many Victorian primary schools, and her stories and experiences from being a public school teacher are stories that I take with me into this role. She told me about kids who came to school not having had breakfast and without their lunch, kids who did not have the right uniform and did not fit in with their classmates and kids who could not go on school excursions because Mum and Dad could not afford them. What my mum’s experiences have taught me is that sometimes the supports around a student are just as important as the classroom in which they learn, because children cannot learn on an empty stomach. Or if you have bad eyes, like me, you might be able to get your English right, but you definitely cannot do maths on the whiteboard without glasses. That is exactly why this government goes beyond building schools and also supports students and their families with everything that is needed for kids to get the very best start in life. This includes $78 million for the incredible breakfast clubs program, which operates right across my electorate providing breakfast for schoolkids every day; $48 million for the affordable school uniforms program; $2.5 million for Glasses for Kids – I wish that had been around when I was in school; $9 million for period products in schools; and a massive $367 million for camps, sports and excursions so no kid has to miss out on having fun with their friends. It also includes support for travel to and from school, including concessions, and of course the Smile Squad, providing free dental care for kids.

On this side of the house our record is clear. Labor backs record investment in state schools and record investment in specialist schools. We recognise the importance of early learning. That is why we have introduced free kinder for every Victorian child. And we recognise the importance of the skills and qualifications that Victorians can learn at TAFE, which is why we rebuilt TAFE and introduced free TAFE. As the member for Buninyong mentioned earlier, free TAFE has supported 156,000 students in Victoria, saving them almost $432 million in fees. On this side of the house we invest in TAFE and we value lifelong learning, and those on the other side gutted it when they had the chance. They ripped out $1 billion from Victoria’s TAFE system, shut 22 TAFE campuses and sacked 2000 teachers.

But it is not just TAFE, and maybe some new members need a history lesson. We all know that Jeff Kennett closed schools and sacked teachers, and his record on education is clear. He closed 350 ‍schools and sacked 7000 teachers. When Jeff Kennett closed the schools to sell them off, his friend Ted Baillieu sold them. Education changes lives, and Victoria is the Education State. On this side we are committed to investing. On the other side they are committed to cuts and closures.

Jade BENHAM (Mildura) (17:41): As the member for Lara just spoke about, being the Education State goes beyond building schools and facilities and shiny new openings and cutting ribbons. So I am going to talk today about what I know best, and that is my electorate, the tyranny of distance and trying to get to government schools when that tyranny of distance can be over 100 kilometres at a time. I had the chance recently to spend a lot of time in schools delivering books – I spoke about that earlier today ‍– and I have met some exceptional young people from grades 3 to 6 all through Mildura and further south as well. But we do need to make sure – these schools cannot function properly without the proper support.

It is okay to say that we are doing this and there are facilities, because that support is easily accessible in metro Melbourne. It is easily accessible in Bendigo, Ballarat and Geelong. But when you get out to what feels like district 12 to us most of the time, it is not easily accessible, nor is getting support, like the member for Kew said earlier. Mildura West Primary School have had two master plans. The last was in 2018. Their main building that children are learning in they have had to divide up on their own of their own accord, and the main building is being held together by plywood – by plywood! The only part of the master plan – the two master plans – that has been completed is one building, and a toilet block has been renovated. Bart from the P & C says that they are trying to fix a broken leg with botox and they actually need a reconstruction, and he is absolutely right. But trying to get that sort of support and getting someone from within the department to take this on board – and I have written to the minister; I have written to two different education ministers now, and still nothing. There has been a master plan – that is great. We do not want any more master plans; we want some action. We want our kids to go to school in a functional building that is not being held together by plywood and full of white ants.

When we talk about support, we talk about things like this. Yes, facilities are great. I have spoken about Mildura West, the Birchip Early Learning Centre and their school, Again, it has got the early learning centre onsite – great. You build it and they will come – yes, that is true, but I tell you what, build it big enough the first time. All they want to do now is add an extra room, and it simply means they need to move some water tanks for fire. Sounds simple enough, doesn’t it? You would think, but apparently not. They have been trying to do this for a number of years now. All it is is just a sign-off to be able to do this so they can extend the early learning centre. Again, these little things, these little supports for schools in the regions – the actual regions, like district 12 – have such a profound impact on the entire community. When you allow more children into free kinder and day care then you free up people that are able to go back to work as nurses and as teachers, because free kinder is great if you have got the spots for them; it does not really mean much if it is not available.

Also, I have spoken about the housing problem. It has been very topical recently. When I was on council in my previous role, about 2020, we started conversations with the Victorian School Building Authority and with the department about redeveloping teacher housing in Robinvale. Robinvale College – I was there this week too and I spoke about that and the brilliant kids there and the principal, who is still acting principal after 12 months. Again I will backtrack for a bit. When we talk about things in schools and having schools supported having a profound impact on the community, yes, Robinvale College has had its challenges over the past 10 years or so. They have an acting principal in there now that the community love. I hear every time I walk down the street, ‘When is Nat the principal going to be appointed as our permanent principal?’ She wants to embed herself in the community. When you see the school principal at local footy, at local basketball, living in the town rather than commuting from over 100 kilometres away, that has such a huge impact on the community ‍– that single move.

It is the stroke of a pen. This stuff is not hard, it is not rocket science. It is common sense. I talk about common sense in this place all the time because I like to sometimes think I am trying to make common sense sexy again. I do not know how far we are getting. We have a great principal in there now. Again, she has got this common sense where she has employed people within the community. Because we have a high Pacific Islander population, getting parents and people that are qualified to come in as teacher support – for teachers we do not always have – makes sense, because the behaviour of the kids there with their elders around makes a massive difference. These are little commonsense things.

When we talk about teachers at Robinvale College another commonsense move that the college has made is to bring in international teachers, particularly from Ireland. The limitation here is they are only six-month visas. On a 417 visa it is only six months, so they get halfway through the year and they are uprooted again and they have to go back. Surely there can be an exception – for somewhere as isolated as Robinvale – made so that they can stay. We have had some great stories about teachers coming out from Ireland to teach. They fall in love. In fact my next-door neighbour came out from Ireland to teach at Robinvale and married the spud farmer next door. You cannot write about this stuff. Now they have settled in the area and built a new house. They employ people. They are raising their kids there. This is the kind of impact we are talking about – if Victoria really was the Education State – that they would be thinking about, not just cutting ribbons to new facilities in the city. Let us talk about support in the regions and some commonsense approaches here.

Robinvale College – I will keep talking about that for a minute – has been flagged for needing emergency relief teachers and is on the critical list for receiving support. I have had a letter about this only today. Also yes, there have been challenges – the 100 to 115 young people that get on buses every day to go to Mildura is a pretty good indicator of the challenges that they have had. Hopefully that will subside if we get some stability within the school by appointing the principal permanently. That stability has such a huge impact, the stability that comes with having teachers stay for more than six months – I mean, this is just commonsense-type stuff. When we talk about the Education State we have to talk about the support that surrounds these schools, and those 100 to 115 kids that get on a bus every day to travel over 100 kilometres to Mildura get on a bus to go to a private school that has just paid $2 million to expand. They are expanding so rapidly because kids are leaving government schools and going to St Joseph’s College.

A member: That is absolute rubbish.

Jade BENHAM: It is actually not. Feel free to come down and ride the bus and go to St Joseph’s any day of the week. I love it when people comment on something they know absolutely nothing about.

I will backtrack. I have got a couple of minutes left, so I will go back to what I was talking about on teacher housing. Again, there is department housing for these teachers in towns like Robinvale, Donald and Charlton. They are falling down. Honestly, they are almost unliveable, and they are on huge old blocks within these towns. I started some work when I was on council. There were ideas and conversations around, ‘You know what? Let’s see if the department can redevelop these houses.’ You cannot make teachers live together. Why don’t you redevelop these quarter-acre blocks and put one- ‍or two-bedroom units on them, which creates its own little microcosm of activity and support within itself? Again, it makes sense, doesn’t it? I would have thought so.

Again, that was in 2020, so it is four years ago now that those conversations were had. I had a conversation with the CEO of council yesterday, and – crickets; it is just stagnant. Again, this stuff makes sense. If the conversation started three years ago, you would have thought that construction would have started by now, because if you have not got anywhere to house a teacher in a town like Robinvale, for example, they end up living in Mildura – if they can get a house – and then commuting into the sun heading south in the morning and then into the sun heading home at night. That wears thin. That is exhausting stuff, doing an hour-long drive into the sun both ways every day. You lose them to schools in Mildura. So when we talk about being the Education State, we need to talk about support for regional schools, and that is housing, that is support for teachers and principals and that is emergency teachers. Until we get that we cannot call ourselves the Education State. For now, we are nothing but the red tape state.

Eden FOSTER (Mulgrave) (17:51): I rise today to speak on this matter of public importance, noting that Victoria is the Education State, and this is the case despite years of cuts to education by those opposite when in government, resulting in hundreds of school closures. As a high school student during the Kennett era I was traumatised by school closure after school closure. Some of my friends were impacted by that – having to merge with other schools. It is quite a difficult challenge for a young person to abruptly be taken out of your school and have to make a new life for yourself in another school. But the Allan Labor government is investing significantly into our education system, starting from the little learners in three-year-old kinder right through to tertiary studies.

I would like to start with our early childhood reforms. The Allan Labor government has committed $14 billion to expand kindergarten programs across the state under our Best Start, Best Life reforms, with 50 government owned and operated early learning centres. This initiative is a great plan to address childcare shortages in areas of greatest need, and one of those areas benefiting from this plan is located right in the heart of my electorate of Mulgrave. In 2026 Harrisfield Primary School will be home to one of these co-located centres, and what this means is that school drop-offs will be easier for parents in my electorate. It means children in my electorate will have greater opportunities to have an early education, and we know that the research shows that three-year-old kinder offers numerous benefits to children and their families. Not only is the Allan Labor government making kinder free but as a psychologist I know that this initiative and investment in our future generation will help children with socialisation, emotional development, cognitive development, language development, independence, preparation for school and early identification and intervention for any developmental delays and learning difficulties, to name just a few benefits.

I mentioned free kinder. The Allan Labor government has committed $270 million into free kinder for three- and four-year-olds. This will help families save $2500 in fees per child each year. It gives women a chance to return to the workforce and benefits up to 140,000 children. Instead of closing schools, we are building schools. In fact, as we have heard, 14 have just opened this year alone, supporting 9000 students and creating 1600 infrastructure jobs and 333 ongoing jobs in schools – just this year alone. Our reforms to early childhood education do not stop there. Within the next decade we will establish pre-prep, a new universal 30-hour-a-week program of play-based early learning for four-year-old children, because we know that education starts early.

Across the state Victorian schools are getting access to world-class teaching materials and classrooms. Last budget the government announced a $2 billion infrastructure package for schools across the state. This includes funds designated for acquiring new land for schools in our growing areas and over $500 million in new assets for schools across the state.

Paul Edbrooke: How much?

Eden FOSTER: $500 million. Our modernisation upgrades for schools, worth over $355 million from the last budget alone, are upgrading 47 schools across the state, including in my electorate of Mulgrave. No matter the school, this government is supporting those who need it most, both public schools and low-cost independent and Catholic schools.

Last week I visited Nazareth College in Noble Park North, a wonderful area of my electorate. Nazareth has recently opened brand new food technology and media spaces for their students, funded by the state government. When I visited these new spaces I saw firsthand the positive impact the Allan government is making, giving students new opportunities to discover their lifelong passion and gain new skills that will help them over their future years.

Providing a good-quality schooling system is not the only priority of this government. It is also a priority to ensure that families and students are provided with the appropriate support networks to continue their studies and remain in schools. I note that schools are not just for education, they are a community – they are about supporting families and they are about supporting the young person through their wellbeing, through their academic supports and through their social connections.

This especially applies for kids that have additional needs through their schooling. That is why since 2015 we have provided almost $750 million in assistance to help families with the cost of education. This includes, as we have heard, breakfast clubs to make sure that every student starts the day with a full stomach to help with their concentration; State Schools’ Relief, supporting families that are in severe financial hardship; Glasses for Kids, ensuring that kids with eyesight difficulties are given all the support that they need to succeed at school; sanitary products, ensuring access to essential hygiene products for all individuals; money for camps, sports and excursions, making sure that no child is left out of these critical events in their youth; and affordable school uniforms, reducing the risk of bullying towards kids from disadvantaged backgrounds.

I understand what it is like for a family to not have the finances to be able to afford new school uniforms or attend an excursion because it was too expensive and the things a family often goes without for their children to attend school camps or excursions. I know firsthand of the financial struggles many families face, and the Allan Labor government is assisting families with its strong investment into education. As a former school psychologist, I saw the difference that these programs made. The more indirect benefits of these programs of mental health, fitness and academic achievement are also crucial in ensuring Victorian kids are given the greatest opportunities possible and making sure that no matter the postcode you live in you will receive a good-quality education in this state. These measures are all just as important as providing good-quality schools, because there is no point in having the best schools in this country if kids from disadvantaged backgrounds are unable to access our great education.

This government understands the role that education plays in providing opportunities to kids from disadvantaged backgrounds, particularly Indigenous students, kids from poorer families in the outer suburbs and regions and kids with disabilities. Only a few months ago, in December last year, the Minister for Education announced a further 37 schools will share in more than $9 million to create facilities suitable for students of all abilities as part of the ninth round of this government’s Inclusive Schools Fund. Since its establishment the fund has supported children of all abilities, ensuring they are able to enjoy their school lives in the playground, in class and in school clubs. This is on top of funding upgrades to every single specialist school in the state since 2015. We understand the roles these important schools play in our education system, and I am proud that my electorate is home to two of these amazing schools, Springvale Park Special Development School and Monash Special Development School, which both the Premier and Deputy Premier visited with me late last year. This government has invested over $20 million in both schools combined.

I move on quickly to tertiary education, as it is also a crucial pipeline for additional skills, whether that is through the TAFE system or university. This government brought TAFE back from the dead. Those opposite in their time in government killed it, closing 22 campuses across the state and gutting the resources for those that remained. Free TAFE is possibly one of the biggest reforms this government has achieved. More than 150,000 students in Victoria have accessed vocational education on the free TAFE list. More courses are even being added, with six added just last year and four added this year. Our support for tertiary education includes students going to university. Our scholarships for those studying nursing are nation leading and remove more barriers to entry for students wanting to take up nursing as a career – exactly what we need. We are supporting those starting secondary teaching in a similar manner. All students who enrol in secondary teaching this year or in 2025 can access our scholarships, guaranteeing a pipeline of new teachers for our great state schools. No other state or territory can match the number of free or supported tertiary courses that Victoria offers, confirming our spot as the best place to study further education and as the state that is the Education State.

I will continue for the next 17 seconds. From early education and kindergarten to tertiary education throughout the state, this government is backing students and families. That is why I am proud to speak on this matter of public importance today.