MINISTERIAL STATEMENTS
Senator WALSH (Victoria—Minister for Early Childhood Education and Minister for Youth) (17:47): On behalf of the Minister for Education, Mr Clare, I table a statement relating to the Better and Fairer Schools Agreements progress report, together with the report, and I seek leave to make a statement relating to the documents. Leave granted. Senator WALSH: Today, I rise to table the ministerial statement on the Better and Fairer Schools Bill Agreements progress report.
It's a statement that was made in the House earlier today by my friend and colleague the Minister for Education and the member for Blaxland, Jason Clare. It was a very important day for Minister Clare to table this statement. Not only has the minister in the other place presented the progress report on our Better and Fairer Schools Agreement but today marks one year since the Prime Minister and the Minister for Education announced that all states and territories across the nation had signed our Better and Fairer Schools Agreement.
It's been one year since all governments across the nation signed up to fix the funding of our public schools once and for all. The Better and Fairer Schools Agreement is a landmark agreement, and, for the first time, under this agreement, every public school student in every public school, in every part of the country, will receive their full and fair funding.
This is a great Labor commitment and a great Labor achievement that will pay dividends for years to come for our nation's students across the country. It's an absolute game changer for Australia's education system and a life changer for our students. It is the biggest injection of Commonwealth funding into our public schools ever, and it's this Labor government that is delivering it.
It means an additional $16.5 billion over 10 years will be invested in our public schools across the country, with an extra $50 billion in the decade to follow that. The history of the Better and Fairer Schools Agreement is a proud Labor history too, because it was a Labor government who got the ball rolling on fairer funding for our schools. It was former prime minister Julia Gillard who commissioned the Gonski review, and that review told us exactly what we need to do better.
It told us how to build that path to fully funding our schools. It was Labor who set ourselves the task to deliver just that. It's important to reflect on what happened when those opposite came into government and when they took carriage of that incredibly important Gonski review.
It's important to remember how they chose to look at the object of fully funding our public schools. What they did, when they had the reins of government in that period of time, was sit on that Gonski review for almost a decade. Not only did they do that; at the same time, they ripped $30 billion out of our public schools.
So it is no surprise that, over that same period, attendance rates dropped for our school students across the country, high-school completion rates dropped and teacher shortages went up. That's what happens when you overlook—when you shelf—an important review like the Gonski review and instead decide to rip $30 billion out of our public schools. The legislation that we've also passed in the parliament makes it all but impossible for a future Liberal government to do that again—to cut the funding in this agreement—and the Better and Fairer Schools Agreement locks in the money that our public schools need and deserve.
It sets up a long-term arrangement, a 10-year funding agreement, to fund our schools to the level they need to be funded and to a level that supports our students to do their very best, which is what matters for these agreements. These agreements are not a blank cheque. They are tied to real, practical reforms, as the minister outlined today—reforms that are designed to turn around that Liberal legacy of dropping attendance rates, dropping high-school completion rates and dropping teacher workforce levels.
These agreements are tied to real reforms that will help students learn. They're real reforms that are backed by evidence to be effective. They're real reforms that meet the needs of students.
These reforms include year 1 phonics checks and numeracy checks, evidence based teaching practices and more individualised support for students who need it. We know the difference that quality education makes for our children, now and into the future, especially children from disadvantaged backgrounds, like some students in our outer suburbs and our regions, like some of our First Nations students, like some of our students from lower socioeconomic areas and like some of our students with disability.
We want to make sure that those students are set up to succeed and that those students are funded to succeed, and that's exactly what the Better and Fairer Schools Agreement delivers. It is our public schools that do the heavy lifting when it comes to supporting these students in our education system, and it is our public schools that were underfunded by those opposite.
It's to our public schools where we need funding to flow. These are the children who are most likely to fall behind and, when that happens, the impact can flow into adulthood. We want these students to never fall behind, but, if they do, we want them to catch up and keep up, to not only survive but to thrive, in our primary and secondary schools.
We know exactly how important it is for students to finish high school. It really does help set you up for the rest of your life. That is, in part, because it's never been more important to be able to have the capacity to go on to TAFE or a university course, because that opens so many doors for people today.
Right now it's the case that about 60 per cent of Australians have a tertiary qualification. Our universities accord says that we need to grow that proportion to around 80 per cent, and to get there we need to see improvement in school attendance and we need to see improvement in school completion rates. Again, that is exactly what we are funding with real, practical reform tied to our better and fairer schools agreements.
We want to support students, particularly students from disadvantaged backgrounds, at every stage of their education journey so that they can reach their full potential across primary, secondary and tertiary education and even before that—the early years as well. The good news is we are starting to see some green shoots in turning around the legacy that the Liberals left behind.
Just a few weeks ago, the ABS released the data for 2025, and it shows that high-school completion rates are going up across the board, across our different schools, including in our public schools. This is so promising, but we know that it could be even better. We know there's more work to do, and that's why our better and fairer schools agreements are so important.
They're not just about fully funding public schools for the first time ever and not just about locking the funding in for the long-term; they are about delivering evidence based, proven reforms to ensure that our schools continue to deliver high-quality education for generations to come. It's important that I briefly reflect on what the agreements mean for our teachers in our schools.
Being a teacher or an educator is the most important job there is. Our hardworking teachers show up to our public schools and deliver quality education to our children. The work they do is life changing and nation shaping, and we support them and the work they do every step of the way.
Too often our teachers are asked to do this important work without the resources they need, and that's why our funding will also go towards supporting this invaluable workforce. The better and fairer schools agreements are agreements that we in this place should all be proud of. I know that I am proud to be part of a Labor government delivering better and fairer schools funding and reforms that uplift student outcomes, support student wellbeing and back our dedicated teachers.
I commend the minister's statement to the chamber.