Coddington Deborah: State Sector Amendment Bill (No 3) — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee Third Reading 
Coddington Deborah: State Sector Amendment Bill (No 3) — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:616;Page:12197] 
DEBORAH CODDINGTON (ACT) 
: 
 I have heard no arguments today to persuade the ACT party to support this bill. All we have heard this afternoon are the same tired old patronising “we know best for everybody” arguments. 
The Hon Brian Donnelly attacked the National Party for not doing anything. He did not actually inform the House that he was Associate Minister of Education for 2 years during that time and I do not recall any flashes of brilliance coming from him in terms of changing things then. 
This legislation is the example of what happens when more and more power is devolved to the State and taken away from communities. This is the second bill in a row today that we will be passing that enables the Minister to exercise more control over the education sector. The Minister is punishing teachers for striking. This bill is not just about the principle that teachers will not get paid while striking and it is very simplistic for both the Minister and the bill’s supporters to allege that. Of course that is what happened when this Government got rid of bulk funding and landed boards of trustees in the situation where they were the meat in the sandwich. 
But this bill is not just about that. If it were just about that principle as the Minister claimed earlier what about integrated and independent schools as I mentioned earlier? When those teachers strike will this Government hurry through legislation in urgency insisting that the employers of those teachers cannot pay them if they strike? What if those employers—those boards or the boards of trustees in State schools—actually sympathise with their teachers? This is exactly what the union members said when they came to the select committee with their submissions. They said a lot of boards of trustees chose to pay their teachers in order to avoid stress—and I will get on to more of that in a moment. 
This bill is the Minister’s attempt to desperately try to right a wrong that he has already created and he is digging himself further into a hole. The boards of trustees are in essence the representatives of the parents of the children of that school. They are the customers the consumers. They try to have their say on how the school is run and what sort of education is delivered to their children. We have already seen an erosion of parents’ power on boards of trustees because the Minister has imposed more and more compliance costs on those boards. Their time is taken up more with complying with all the legislation rather than having any sort of meaningful say in the quality of education their children receive. They have absolutely no say in how to reward good teachers and get rid of bad teachers. That is entirely removed from them. 
The centre-right knows what the top priority of education is. We heard Lynne Pillay say in this House that the top priority of education was jobs. So we have this huge bureaucracy and taxpayers have all that money taken off them to keep people in jobs? Excuse me but I thought education was about teaching children to learn and become autonomous and independent so that they can go out and support themselves later in life. That is what the centre-right knows education is all about and that is why the centre-right says give parents the freedom to choose. Bring in student entitlements vouchers tax credits—whatever they are to be called—it does not matter. 
We heard Brian Donnelly say that simplistic options do not work. 
Hon Brian Donnelly 
: Absolutely. 
DEBORAH CODDINGTON 
: That is typical of a politician who thinks he knows best and that ordinary parents cannot choose and do not know what is best for their children. I do not know what is best for Brian Donnelly’s children and he does not know what is best for my children. Politicians do not know what is best for children; parents know what is best. Families know and they do not have that choice. 
Peter Brown 
: Not always. 
DEBORAH CODDINGTON 
: Yes sometimes they do get it wrong but they do not get it wrong as often as the Government does. I will guarantee that. 
Jim Peters said he was championing the cause of the Post Primary Teachers Association. I wish he had read the association’s submission before he came into the House and said that because I would like to tell members what the association said when it came before the select committee. It drew our attention to the fact that the Government’s explanatory note to the bill suggested that there was an ill to be remedied. To remedy that ill the Government proposed to confer on the commissioner—effectively the Secretary for Education by delegation of the Act—all the rights duties and powers of an employer under the Employment Relations Act. As the Post Primary Teachers Association very correctly pointed out the Secretary for Education—the Government—already has huge powers to intervene in collective bargaining pass regulations and dictate to teachers what they can and cannot do. No other employer—I am not saying this it comes from the Post Primary Teachers Association—has the full powers of the State at its disposal. 
The second important issue the association brought to the select committee’s attention was the fact that the Government had said that whether teachers might or might not lose pay be suspended or locked out was not an incentive for them to take industrial action. The Post Primary Teachers Association objected strongly to the use of the word “incentive” in terms of why its members decided to strike or not to strike. As it said when making decisions about strike action teachers are aware that their pay is at risk and that suspension or lockout could also result. Of course they are aware of that and take it into consideration but more often than not their decisions to take industrial action are driven by the belief that the position adopted by the Government in bargaining will be to the disadvantage of students. 
There may well be some teachers who are cynically opportunist but many boards of trustees—as I have said and as the Post Primary Teachers Association pointed out—chose to support the position of teachers rather than that of the ministry because the implementation of the National Certificate of Educational Achievement was increasing the workload on teachers. That is why teachers decided to take industrial action and the boards of trustees as good employers were concerned about the stress on their employees and they had the right to support them then. Under this bill the rights of boards of trustees to support their own teachers is being taken away.