Thursday, 17 August 2023

Inclusive education

Ann-Marie HERMANS (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (17:51): (419) My adjournment is also for the Minister for Education, and the action I seek is that she revise the disastrous decision made by the Andrews Labor government to cut the visiting teacher service – a service which has been delivered by 117 specialised teachers across the state, who provided tailored support to students with a disability and in some cases life-threatening illnesses – and reinstate not only the program with all the teachers but actually increase it to have more teachers. As we know, 85 have been cut, and there are even rumours that the remaining 32 would also be being offered packages at this time. This callous decision to remove frontline teachers from schools takes teachers with specialist skills, such as teaching braille and Auslan, for example, away from the most vulnerable of our children, those that deserve the opportunity to experience a normal, happy education experience in the classroom – an inclusive education experience in the classroom. We have to remember that blind schools, for instance, were shut down so that children could actually be part of an inclusive education program. Now the support that they have in these schools is being cut, and that is simply not good enough.

These children rely on these teachers, and it is going to be a disastrous step backwards and a total, absolute disaster when the government’s responsibility to these young people is letting them down so that they cannot even have an education. In fact we even know at this moment that there are families that are now having to homeschool, and they simply do not know what they are going to do. One mother that I met this week talked about her son, who had a broken arm because he cannot see where he is going. He does not have the support to be shown around in all the different areas and to know how he is going to be able to get along in every day of his school life. These children should not have to pay the price for Labor’s economic incompetence.

At present the Department of Education, through the visiting program, has had specialised teachers that have been teaching one-on-one, supporting children with their special needs through an additional curriculum that has allowed them to be able to prepare for life and for vocational opportunities, and this is being taken away. Bright kids who should have the opportunity to have an education are now going to be in a situation where the average teacher simply cannot deliver. They do not know braille. They cannot put curriculum together in braille. No wonder we are losing so many of our teachers out of the education program. It is becoming an untenable situation.

On that note, I simply want to say that teachers are actually not getting paid enough for the work that they do. They work long hours. People think they have these long holidays. They work after school; they work weekends to prepare for children. And this is simply not being looked after by this government.