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Friday, 23 November 1979

Senator WRIEDT (Tasmania) (Leader of the Opposition) - The Senate has before it two Bills, the States Grants (Schools Assistance) Bill 1979 and the States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Amendment Bill (No. 2) 1979. The Bills essentially deal with Federal allocation of finance to the States for schools and tertiary education. Recognising that there are some time constraints upon us, I do not intend to involve myself in any lengthy detailed argument concerning Government policy on education, other than to consider the broad aspect of what has transpired in the past four years. I do not think anyone would deny that over those four years and the four Budgets of the present Government there has been a significant decline in the importance of finance to education throughout Australia. I believe that there are ample figures to prove that proposition, which I will come to again in a moment. We need to look at the undertaking that was given on 20 May 1 976 by the then Treasurer, Mr Lynch. In a statement to the Parliament he made reference to the Government's intentions in respect of education expenditure. On page 2339 of Hansard he is recorded as saying:

He went on to itemise that for universities there would be a 2 per cent growth in real terms, for colleges of advanced education there would be a 5 per cent growth in real terms, for technical and further education institutions there would be a 7.5 per cent growth in real terms and for schools there would be a 2 per cent growth in real terms. On the following page of Hansard he is shown as making this statement when talking about the three-year rolling program:

It is interesting to look at one or two remarks contained in the statement. He refers to the fact that he wants to avoid the stop-start situation of recent years. This is a fairly obvious reference to the financial arrangements for education that had been obtained during the three years of the previous Labor Government. As everybody knows, during those three years there was the greatest advance in support, by Commonwealth funding, for education in Australia in both the tertiary sector and the schools sector of any period in Australian history, to the point where it may be claimed that the Federal Government of the day was overly generous to the States in providing funding for education. However, it should be remembered that there had been many years of neglect until that period. I do not wish to canvass those arguments now other than to restate that the assistance given during that period was an attempt to make up for the years of neglect that had obtained prior to 1972. In 1976 we had these commitments about increases in real terms for the education sectors. But, of course, that had not happened.

I will turn to the figures of the Schools Commission and the total expenditures estimated at December 1978 price levels. In 1976 the expenditure on the Schools Commission program- I will keep these figures to the nearest million dollars- amounted to $635m. In 1977 it was $658m; in 1978, $66 lm; in 1979, $669m and in 1 980 it dropped to $63 1 m. We have a variation in these figures and we should cast our minds back to the original figure I mentioned in 1 976 of $635m. When we relate those figures in constant terms we find there is actually a decline of 0.6 of one per cent in expenditure in 1980 back to $63 lm. In other words, funding has not quite kept up in real terms with what it was five years ago. The commitment to maintain these real growth figures has not been kept. The argument advanced to support that reduction in real terms is that the school population is declining and will continue to decline for some years to come. The argument is true and can be substantiated. However, we are building up a legacy of reduced standards of education which we will not feel so much in the immediate years ahead but certainly will be felt in the late 1980s and early 1990s. In other words, we will be recreating the same position of neglect which we inherited in 1972. Due to this neglect, in 1 972 a very large injection of moneys was necessary to raise the standards of education to the levels that have been recommended by the Karmel Committee.

I put it to the Government that no matter how easy it may be from a budgetary point of view to freeze funding for education on the grounds that the need is no longer there as it was some years ago, it should consider very seriously the legacy which we, in this period of the late 1970s and early 1980s, will be handing on to other people who will have to deal with these matters in perhaps 10 or 15 years time. Perhaps the Minister for Education (Senator Carrick) when he replies can give me some up-to-date information on this. It should be borne in mind that there was a proposal at the Australian Education Council meeting in December 1977 for a cost-sharing arrangement program to be introduced whereby the Commonwealth and the States would share all costs of education. At the present time, tertiary education- universities and colleges of advanced education- are funded wholly by the Commonwealth. A joint sharing arrangement exists already with technical education in schools. As I understand it, a proposal was put by Senator Carrick that there would be some uniform cost-sharing arrangement involving all sectors of education. Some of the States reacted very unfavourably to that information because they felt that a greater financial burden would be placed on them. I do not doubt that if that proposal comes to fruition there will be a greater financial burden on them because the States bearing a greater proportion of financial responsibility, not only in education but in most spheres of government is consistent with the federalism concept. I ask the Minister whether he can advise the Parliament on the position of those negotiations. Is it still the Government's intention to pursue that proposal of two years ago? It is important for us to know because we know that in July this year the Prime Minister (Mr Malcolm Fraser) wrote to all the Premiers spelling out very clearly his intention not to maintain the present funding arrangements between the Commonwealth and the States. In the letter to the Tasmanian Premier the Prime Minister said:

He was referring, of course, to the general purpose payments to the States through tax sharing arrangements under the federalism policy. If in fact the Prime Minister is adamant that that is his position- and everything I know from what I hear of discussions at official levels suggests that he means it- payments to the States in the immediate years ahead will become less generous than they are now which will mean a reduction in real terms. This has very significant implications for education funding by the States. So much of what they are able to do for education, both in recurrent and capital expenditure, is largely dependent on the tax sharing arrangements and Commonwealth payments to the States. I ask the Minister whether he can advise us of the present position. In respect of the States Grants (Schools Assistance) Bill I move:

In relation to the States Grants (Tertiary Education Assistance) Bill I move:

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