Thursday, 14 August 2025

Community safety

Jess WILSON (Kew) (17:18): (1265) My adjournment is for the Minister for Education, and the action I am seeking is his public clarification on whether he believes Mr Richard Minack is suitable to teach and whether he will be returning to teaching or leadership roles in Victorian public schools. Mr Minack was found in 2023 by the Federal Court to have unlawfully discriminated against four Jewish students by failing to address antisemitic bullying and swastika graffiti at Brighton Secondary College while principal there. In her 450-page judgement Justice Mortimer found that there was an inexplicable and unusual tolerance for antisemitic graffiti and a preparedness to ignore, downplay and take less seriously the complaints made by Jewish students and their families at the school under Mr Minack’s tenure. The court heard that one student was bashed, spat at, called an ‘effing Jew’, told to die in an oven, had ‘Heil Hitler’ drawn on his locker and was held at knifepoint. The court also singled out another teacher at Brighton Secondary College at the time, Mr Paul Varney, for not taking antisemitic behaviour seriously and for repeatedly addressing a Jewish student in Hebrew, causing him embarrassment and humiliation.

The court found that Mr Minack had breached section 9 of the Racial Discrimination Act 1975 by his failures and omissions to take action at a systemic and coordinated level to address a high level of antisemitic bullying and harassment of Jewish students by other students and high levels of swastika graffiti at the school and to enforce the policies of the school on racial harassment in relation to antisemitic bullying and the harassment of Jewish students by other students and in relation to the display of antisemitic graffiti at the school. The minister will of course be aware that the Department of Education was required to pay damages to the tune of several hundred thousand dollars to the Jewish students who brought the case and issue a written apology.

However, the Herald Sun has reported this week that Mr Minack remains an employee of the Department of Education, has retained his registration with the Victorian Institute of Teaching and has not faced any disciplinary action. I understand that Mr Minack retains his employment with the Department of Education and is currently on leave. I note the department has not advised whether this leave is paid or not. I also note that the Victorian Institute of Teaching is responsible for ensuring that those who apply for registration are suitable to teach – that is, that their character, reputation and conduct are such that they should be allowed to teach in a school or early childhood service. The Minister for Education has repeatedly said that antisemitism has no place in our schools or in our state. So I ask the minister again: does he believe that Mr Richard Minack is suitable to teach as per the definition provided by the Victorian Institute of Teaching and will Mr Minack be returning to teaching or leadership roles in Victorian public schools in the future?