Why the silence on cuts to public education?

There has always been public approval for programs that increase Australia’s educational standards, with the public buying into the notion of upskilling in a competitive global economy. Maurie Mulheron comments on the recent announcement by the NSW government to cut funding to public schools.

Public education has nobody in the bureaucracy prepared to publicly defend it from poor government policy, no matter how severe the cuts.

If ever Federation needed vindication of its analysis that Local Schools, Local Decisions and its cousin, Every Student, Every School, was about cutting funds to public schools, it certainly occurred with the leaking by the privates to the Murdoch press of the NSW Government’s intention to cut private school funding as well.

The Premier said: “I’m certain that the independent and Catholic school sectors aren’t suggesting that any cuts to education should simply fall and only fall on public education.” (Sydney Morning Herald, September 10)

But what cuts? At Local School, Local Decisions community forums around NSW we have had phalanges of School Education Directors, not to mention the odd Regional Director, desperate to prove their loyalty by denying the very thing that the Premier confirmed: public education in NSW is being cut by hundreds of millions of dollars each year.

Then, days later, on September 11, the Minister confirmed the most savage cuts to public education in the state’s history. And yet, when the Federation predicted these cuts we were called scare-mongers and liars.

Contrast the reaction of the private school employers, when they learned about the NSW Government’s intention to cut private school funding, with the role of the Department of Education and Communities.

According to media reports, the Minister spoke to the independents and Catholics on September 5 at what he thought was a confidential briefing. They left the meeting and immediately telephoned the Murdoch press about the NSW Government’s intention to cut private school funding. The Minister has learnt an old lesson: it is never safe to stand between the rich and a bucket of public money.

Why did this intention to cut funding to private schools achieve so much heat so quickly? It attests to the political power of the privileged.

Firstly, their employers act to protect their systems. They went into overdrive immediately. Contrast this to the public employer, the Department of Education and Communities (DEC), which protects the Government. Secondly, the cuts to the privates are direct which means the Government was exposed immediately. The cuts to the public system were being disguised through devolution and marketed as ‘school autonomy’. Thirdly, private school principals and teachers are encouraged to inform their communities. Contrast this with the bullying by some DEC officers of public school teachers and principals when the latter attempted to alert their school communities to cuts.

While both The Australian (September 7) and The Sydney Morning Herald (September 10) mention a cut to public schools of $250 million in recurrent funding, this is merely a rough projection achieved by multiplying the $67 million by four. Federation expects the cuts to public education to be much deeper, and DEC estimates the total required savings to be $1.7 billion.

The DEC’s September 11 announcement reduces public education staff by 1800 over four years (600 in state and regional offices; 800 in TAFE and 400 support staff in schools).

It is legislated in NSW that the state government gives funding to private schools at a rate set at 25 per cent of what is spent in the public sector. For years this has meant that any betterment the public education community achieves through campaigns is automatically passed onto the private sector, without it having to lift a finger.

The Government has imposed a Labour Expense Cap (1.2 percent per year) to achieve savings across the public sector. This expense cap does not apply to private schools and the September 11 announcement confirms a freeze on private school funding but not a cut.
 
The lessons from this are clear and simple:

This is further confirmation that the public sector is being attacked and that hundreds of millions of dollars in recurrent funding is being ripped out of the public school system, through the loss of staffing entitlements, the loss of support positions as well as cuts to special education, head office directorates and equity programs.

Devolution is exposed, not as a reform but linked to deliberate cuts and permanent structural changes, delivered over four budget cycles.

It would appear that the NSW Government is positioning itself to lower the funding base to education just as they enter the Gonski negotiations with the Federal Government on the shared funding responsibilities.

Public education has nobody in the bureaucracy prepared to publicly defend it from poor government policy, no matter how severe the cuts.

Yes, we’ve heard it before, ‘we were only following orders’. It has never been a satisfactory defence. But clearly, there is little joy in being vindicated.

Now it is time for everyone across our sector, principals, teachers and parents, to unite against the cuts to public education. As clever as Local Schools, Local Decisions is as a marketing term, it was never going to be accepted once the reality of what it is designed to do was confirmed.
 

Maurie Mulheron is the President of the New South Wales Teachers Federation.