2024-09-06
The Greens say Labor’s school funding plan is a ‘reverse Robin Hood’, bleeding public schools dry to give to wealthy private schools.
New analysis from the AEU shows that more than half of all Australian private schools receive more government funding per student than comparable public schools.
Labor’s proposed ‘Better and Fairer’ Schools Agreement does nothing to address this and will actually lock in another decade of underfunding for public schools, cementing Australia’s school system as one of the OECD’s most unequal and segregated.
Comments attributable to Greens spokesperson on Primary and Secondary Education, Senator Penny Allman-Payne:
“Every single school parent can see that this is a deeply broken, inequitable and damaging system.
“Even when you hold a private school and a public school next to each other that are as similar in demographic as possible, the current system still tilts the scales in favour of the private system.
“Every day this year, the federal Government will give $51 million to private schools. Every day. Who can look a public school parent in the eye and say that’s a fair system?
“Cranbrook School, known for its $125 million redevelopment including an aquatic centre, received $4.5 million in Commonwealth government funding in 2022, while also making $62m from parents in fees. It’s an absolute joke and the only ones laughing are rich private schools.
“The Government is making a choice. It is choosing to further entrench a two-tier system where public schools take the vast majority of disadvantaged students and struggle by on inadequate funding.
“Let me make this clear: public schools deserve full ongoing funding and cannot be left to scrape by on less than the bare minimum. Labor’s deal is not a deal for full funding. Public schools are currently underfunded by $32 billion across the next five years and this deal will not close the gap.
“If this is the model that the federal education minister is looking to roll out to the rest of the country then Labor is leaving 2.5 million public school kids short changed. Again.
“This is a deal to continue the underfunding of public schools and leave another generation of kids behind.
“I am seriously concerned that the Government intends to set and forget their contribution to public schooling at 22.5%, when it should be at least 25%, thereby locking in another generation to below adequate public schooling.”