Tuesday, 13 August 2019

Australian Council for Health, Physical Education and Recreation

Mr SOUTHWICK (Caulfield) (19:03): (878) The matter I wish to raise is for the Minister for Education, and it relates to the distribution of politically inaccurate and offensive materials by the Australian Council for Health, Physical Education and Recreation, known as ACHPER. The action that I seek is that the minister withdraw all funding from ACHPER.

Last month ACHPER distributed a package of school-assessed coursework, and the task included one sample exam claiming:

An example of an individual being persecuted for their religion could be the Arab families living in Israel who practise the Islam religion rather than the Jewish religion.

This offensive and completely inaccurate response was first noticed by a Mount Scopus college student whose family were born in Israel and were horrified by the outrageously false and misleading VCE exam materials. The principal of Mount Scopus Memorial College, Rabbi James Kennard, has raised this matter with ACHPER, but to date no apology has been forthcoming nor a clear explanation provided as to how such libellous and offensive materials were approved and circulated by ACHPER.

With a 59 per cent increase in anti-Semitic incidents in Australia in 2017–18 compared to the previous year, such materials merely act to heighten hostility towards the Jewish community, particularly when directed to the broader student body, who may not be informed as to the many complexities of Middle Eastern politics. I note in 2016 we had a similar anti-Semitic incident when the VCE authority had an outrageously misleading play depicting Israel as a blood-thirsty, evil war machine. These biased materials were once again clearly pushing a political agenda to VCE students.

I wrote to the minister about these issues about four weeks ago and received a response yesterday. Whilst the minister has acknowledged these materials are offensive and have no place in our schools, he was quick to distance himself from ACHPER, saying it is an independent body, and he expressed concern about it. I have since been made aware that the Victorian Department of Education and Training is listed on its website as a funding partner of ACHPER, confirming that this organisation is financially supported by the Victorian state government. Therefore the action I am seeking is that the minister withdraw state government financial support until a written apology is received from ACHPER, until ACHPER advises what actions they have taken regarding the disseminated anti-Semitic, libellous materials and until they advise what clear steps they will be taking to ensure politically biased materials are not distributed under their name in the future.