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Breaking
News: Week of 25 February 2008
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Saturday – Sunday, 1 – 2 March
- ABC News
- Teachers back in IRC
"The State School Teachers Union expects to be called back before the Industrial Relations Commission today as the government tries to avert a stop-work meeting planned for Thursday."The Union's secretary David Kelly says the state-wide stop work meeting has the support of members.
"He says it is a pity the government is not as quick to put an offer on the table as it is to put the union in front of the Commission.
"I expect that we will have the paperwork this morning and I expect to be the Commission this afternoon," he said.
"The Opposition's education spokesman, Peter Collier, says the Government has seriously underestimated teachers' frustration.
"The move to take the union to the IRC is probably going to, if anything, incite further anger and frustration amongst teachers," he said.
"He says there is an easy solution, and that is to pay teachers more.
"The minister can offer a substantial across-the-board salary increase to all teachers - not just those at the periphery."
"This would provide an unambiguous message to teachers that they are valued." [emphasis added]
From ABC News at link
- The West Australian
- Letters to the Editor (pages 22-23)
- Slap in the face for teachers
"As a passionate, highly motivated and caring primary school teacher I am writing to express my frustration about the teacher pay issue.
"Despite the mammoth hours I put in outside of school, and the constant pressure I am under in what is an increasingly demanding vocation, I do not expect a pay increase for any of this.
"What upsets me is the possible public perception that teachers are being unreasonable in their demands. I have not yet heard in the media any mention of why I and most teachers I have spoken to have a real problem with the offer we have been presented with.
"In real terms, we are facing a pay decrease. The dollar amount presented is not in line with inflation and the consumer price index. Personally, this is a slap in the face when I have decided to cut my classroom hours back to four das a week to cope with my workload. I still work on my day off and usually one whole day on the weekend. I work every evening after school and on holidays.
"I have a debt for my studies of $15,000 and a four-year degree that does not earn me anywhere near the income of fellow university graduates in other fields. No one would go through this and put up with the conditions that teachers put up with if they did not care deeply about our children - your children.
"Please support our teachers. They are working incredibly hard to give your children the best possible education and start in life."
Samantha Metcalf, Padbury
In Short
"Education Minister Mark McGowan just doesn't get it with his "putty filler" approach to the teacher shortage and the subsequent disintegration of the public education system. Instead of paying recruiting agencies, media outlets, marketing and advertising agencies a fortune to make a lot of noise interstate and overseas in the off-chance that it will attract teachers (which it doesn't), why not give teachers an immediate 30 per cent pay rise across the board with annual increases link to the CPI, then watch the stampede of WA-trained teachers back to you? Only when you are serious about making teachers' salaries competitive with other industry salaries will the public take teaching seriously again."
A. Arundel, Swan View
- Editorial
Wage claims reveal the other side of Ripper's golden windfall (page 20)
"Treasurer Eric Ripper is discovering the hard way that the economic boom which has poured such largesse into the State's coffers - and given the Carpenter Government a rare degree of financial freedom - is also the cause of arguably its biggest challenge: how to balance wage demands with the possibility of increasing inflation and creating a financial burden for les prosperous times..."The threatened strike on Thursday by State schoolteachers is the first of many possible skirmishes ahead, as public servants outline their demands for better pay and conditions. Certainly they are claims based on solid ground..."
"Teachers are at the forefront of the latest campaign. Again this year there is a shortage of secondary school teachers and the Government has had to conduct aggressive recruiting campaigns to try to meet the demand for staff. Dissatisfaction with pay and conditions is one reason fewer people are joining the profession and there are predictions that teacher numbers will fall further in the next few years.
"The State School Teachers Union already has rejected a 13 per cent offer from the Government, and is demanding 20 per cent over three years - inspired, no doubt, by the fact that police officers were granted an increase of that size last year. The Community and Public Sector Union wants a 23 per cent wage rise over three years, a claim the Government has rejected..."
"There is little doubting the validity of the wages claims. The challenge for the Government is to decide on a level which is fair, which will not contribute to inflationary pressures, which will not enrage a Federal Government calling for wage restraint and which will help the Government boost, or at least retain, its necessary workforce. The recent spending splash has made it difficult to argue that there is a shortage of money.
"A fair increase lies between what the unions demand and what the Government is offering. Kowtowing to union pressure will free a genie which the Government will find impossible to put back in the bottle and which has the potential to emperil the State's economic future." [emphasis added]
Full Editorial in The West Australian
- Teachers expected in IR Commission today [updated online story]
by Karen Hodge
"The pay stoush between WA teachers and the State Government could end up before the Industrial Relations Commission today."State School Teachers Union president Anne Gisborne told thewest.com.au that she was aware the Education Department had called on the Commission to intervene after the union announced a half-day strike for Thursday morning.
"The strike action will see thousands of teachers walk out of classrooms.
"The stop-work is due to ongoing frustration by teachers about stalled pay negotiations and work conditions.
"Ms Gisborne said that while she had not received any formal request to go to the commission she expected to go there later today.
“I am assuming we will end up in the Commission today but have heard nothing official,” Ms Gisborne said.
"The department is encouraging parents to send their children to school on Thursday."
From The West Australian at link
- Last-ditch bid to stop teachers' pay strike (page 5)
The State Government will make a desperate bid today to stop thousands of public school teachers walking off the job on Thursday amid revelations that principals have been warned not to speak out about the strike.
- The Age
- Teachers reject Pike's plea to halt strikes
by Farrah Tomazin
"State Education Minister Bronwyn Pike has appealed to Victoria's teachers' union to cancel plans for more strikes this week, but the teachers have rejected Ms Pike's request, and accused the minister of lying about the cost of a pay increase and improved conditions."Hundreds of teachers are this week expected to walk off the job for the third time in three months, as part of a series of half-day strikes at schools in Labor seats.
"The rolling stoppages will start tomorrow in the Broadmeadows electorate of Premier John Brumby and continue until April unless the Government gives teachers a pay rise beyond its current offer of a 3.25% increase a year.
"Opposition education spokesman Martin Dixon said both the Government and the union would eventually have to soften their claims. "Both sides will have to give. It can't continue on at this rate because it's the children and the parents that are suffering," he said."
From The Age at link
- Faith school boom 'creates division'
The rapid growth of faith-based schools under the previous federal government has threatened the social cohesion of the nation, according to Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard's most senior education adviser.
- Japan open for India's lessons
by Martin Fackler
"Japan is suffering a crisis of confidence these days about its ability to compete with its emerging Asian rivals, China and India. But even in this fad-obsessed nation, one result was never expected: a growing craze for Indian education.
"Despite an improved economy, many Japanese are feeling insecure about the nation's schools, which once turned out students who consistently ranked at the top of international tests. That is no longer true, which is why many Japanese are looking for lessons from India, the country they see as the world's ascendant education superpower.
"Bookstores are filled with titles such as Extreme Indian Arithmetic Drills and The Unknown Secrets of the Indians. Newspapers carry reports of Indian children memorising multiplication tables far beyond nine times nine, the standard for young elementary students in Japan..."
Full story in The Age at link
- The Australian
- Muslims want unis to fit prayer time
Muslim university students want lectures to be rescheduled to fit in with prayer timetables and separate male and female eating and recreational areas established on Australian campuses.
- The Washington Post
- Reading and Math Curtailing Other Topics, Study Finds
by Maria Glod
"The No Child Left Behind law has led many elementary schools to spend more time on reading and math and less on social studies, science, art and recess, a report released last week finds..."
"Curriculum narrowing, as the phenomenon is known, has become a key issue in the debate over revamping the law. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), chairman of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, has said he plans to introduce a bill this spring to reauthorize the law with changes."It certainly puts the question before Congress. Is there a price being paid for raising kids' math and reading scores?" Jennings said.
"Concerns that too many students might be missing important science and history lessons or the creativity of art and music have led many educators to lobby for a broader yardstick of school success. Some proposals would give more weight to achievement in science, social studies and physical education..."
Full story in The Washington Post at link
The report can be read on the Center on Education Policy's Web site at http://www.cep-dc.org
- The West Australian
- Teachers told to call off strike (page 3)
by Bethany Hiatt and Robert Taylor"The State Schools Teachers' Union could face deregulation if it pushes ahead with industrial action after the WA Industrial Relations Commission last night ordered the union to call off its half-day strike planned for Thursday.
"WAIRC Commissioner Jennifer Harrison determined the stop-work meeting should not take place because it was not in the public interest while negotiations were taking place.
"SSTU president Anne Gisborne said that the union's executive would have to decide whether to comply with the commission's directive. The earliest it could meet was this afternoon.
"At this point in time we will take this information back to our executive and the current directive to attend stop-work rallies around the State still remains in place until otherwise determined," she said. "Our executive will no doubt be concerned that the Minister has sought to interfere and prevent us speaking directly to our members about what is a serious matter for our members and for the broader community."
"The union had directed teachers to attend the half day stop-work meeting in support of its campaign for increases of 20 per cent over three years.
"Ms Gisborne said it had not been an easy decision to call the stop-work meeting and teachers would not be happy if that decision was reversed without serious consideration.
"SSTU general secretary David Kelly said the executive had to carefully consider the ramifications of going ahead with the rallies.
"We would be defying the commission's order and they have powers under the At to take punitive action against the union," he said. "The worst-case scenario is deregistration."
"Department of Education and Training director-general Sharyn O'Neill was pleased with the result. "All I am interested in is getting back to good negotiations and a good outcome for teachers," she said.
"The commission's directive to call off the strike comes after principals warned yesterday that they feared students would not be adequately supervised on Thursday morning because most staff would be attending the rally. Their warning was at odds with the department's directive that children should be sent to school.
"The department has sent principals a pro-forma letter to use when providing advice to parents, which says that students who attend school on Thursday "will be supervised".
"But a primary school principal told The West Australian he believed that his school would have not teachers on Thursday if the strike went ahead.
"A high school principal also expressed his concern about the department's letter because of indications that many staff would be taking part in the stop-work meeting.
"I have concerns that the duty of care responsibility will not be able to be adequately fulfilled," he said. Alan Carpenter said industrial action would not help anybody.
"The teachers' union is being offered a pay deal which will make them the best paid teachers of any State in Australia," the Premier said. "Taking industrial action will serve no purpose, it will only serve to disadvantage ordinary schoolkids who want to go to school and learn."
"Mr Carpenter said he understood that in a booming economy everyone wants to be paid more. "But there are limits to what the community, the taxpayers, can afford to pay," he said.
"If I believed that the offer being made to the teachers' union was inadequate or not good enough, then I'd have some sympathy for them in their decision to take industrial action."
"But … it's a very good offer."
From The West Australian
Teachers' rally to target Brumby
AAP
"Up to 1000 Victorian teachers will rally outside Premier John Brumby's electoral office as part of their campaign for better pay and conditions."Australian Education Union (AEU) Victorian Branch President Mary Bluett says teachers from the Maribyrnong, Broadmeadows, Sunbury and Melton areas will attend the stopwork rally, the first of 35 planned throughout the first two terms of school.
"Local teachers have been left with no choice but to stop work today," Ms Bluett said.
"A significant number of public schools in the north-west region are experiencing teacher shortages, which is affecting class sizes and limiting the number and quality of subjects on offer to students."
"She said that after 12 months of fruitless negotiations, Mr Brumby and Education Minister Bronwyn Pike were refusing to sit down and negotiate a new agreement.
"The AEU is prepared to meet at any time, but the minister is trying to force us back into talks with powerless bureaucrats who have no authority to make decisions," Ms Bluett said.
"She said Victorian teachers were the lowest paid in Australia, with those at the top of the scale receiving 15 per cent less - or nearly $10,000 less per year - than their NSW counterparts.
"The union is campaigning for a 10 per cent rise to bring Victorian teachers into line with other states, but the state government has offered 3.25 per cent."
From The West Australian at link
- ABC News
- Teachers undecided about Thursday strike
"Parents of the public school students in Western Australia will not find out until tomorrow afternoon whether they should send their children to school on Thursday."The State School Teachers Union will decide tomorrow whether to heed an Industrial Relations Commission order to call off a half-day stop work meeting planned for Thursday.
"The Education Department says, if teachers go ahead with the industrial action, it will be up to principals to decide whether individual schools will close.
"Stephen Breen of the WA Primary Principals Association says parents won't be informed until the end of the school day tomorrow.
"Principals will be discussing the arrangements with staff tomorrow and I think letters will probably be going home to all parents informing them of the arrangements at their school," he said."
From ABC News at link
- Teachers may defy IR Commission: union
"The State School Teachers Union says its members may defy an order by the Western Australian Industrial Relations Commission to cancel a stop work meeting planned for Thursday."The commission yesterday found the proposed industrial action was not in the public interest, because negotiations about a new pay deal for teachers are on-going.
"The President of the State School Teachers Union, Anne Gisborne, says executive members will discuss the order today and will be seeking more information before deciding whether to abide by the ruling.
"We'll seek legal advice and I would suspect that that legal advice will be reasonably detailed and we'll be wanting to speak to them face to face," she said.
"The order certainly does call on us to lift the directive two which is the stop work meeting on the 28th of February. The directive is still in place, our executive will need to meet and consider the ramifications of this particular order."
From ABC News at link
- The Australian
- Academic questions multiple choices
by Justine Ferrari, Education writer
"It is time to stop introducing change in the nation's classrooms without discovering whether students' learning improved as a result.
"In an interview with The Australian just before stepping down as president of the NSW Board of Studies, Gordon Stanley also questioned whether school curriculums contained too many subjects, making it difficult to sustain quality across the board.
"He said school systems had placed a premium on innovation for its own sake, without evaluating what worked.
"The people most opposed to the collection of evidence hold a strong philosophical position, and they're not interested in any challenges to that position," he said.
"But one needs to support those belief positions. It's unfortunate if you just want to have debates about philosophical positions without coming down to an analysis of what the implications of these are for learning.
"When you're focused on evidence-based practice, you keep focus on the question of what really works instead of having a debate about the philosophy you hold."
"Professor Stanley is stepping down after 10 years to become the Pearson professor of educational assessment at Oxford University, and the founding director of the Oxford University Centre for Educational Assessment.
"During his tenure, the NSW Higher School Certificate has been held up as the gold standard for the nation and is recognised internationally.
"While Professor Stanley nominates the integration of vocational courses in the HSC as one of his biggest successes, he questioned the range of subject choices facing students.
"I suspect we have too much choice, and too much choice can be confusing for students," he said. "It's worth asking the question whether we've gone too far in differentiating the curriculum.
"The more offerings you have, the harder it is to provide well-trained teachers in all these areas. At an individual school level, it's hard to provide all those options for students. And the more differentiated the curriculum, the more expensive it is to deliver."
"NSW has also been more successful than other states and territories in withstanding the fads that pass through education, such as integrating history and geography into Studies of Society and the Environment, as occurred elsewhere in the nation.
"Professor Stanley said NSW "connects with (educational fads) but we don't yield to them without trying to get an understanding of whether in balance they're the appropriate direction to go".
From The Australian at link
- The Age
- Schools disrupted as teachers stage half-day strike
by Farrah Tomazin
"Dozens of schools will be shut or severely disrupted again today as teachers walk off the job for the third time in as many months over wages and working conditions.
"Classes will be cancelled at schools in Melbourne's north-west suburbs as up to 900 teachers strike to attend a rally in Premier John Brumby's Broadmeadows electorate."The half-day strike is the first of 35 rolling stoppages targeted at Labor-held seats until April, unless the Government gives teachers a better wage deal.
"As schools brace themselves for industrial chaos over the next few months, parents are increasingly concerned about the impact on students."Parents Victoria president Elaine Crowle said the half-day strikes would end up disrupting the whole day for many pupils because many would not return to class after they had been away all morning.
"We're still sympathetic to the teachers' cause and believe they deserve parity with other states, but certainly parents are becoming quite concerned that students' education will suffer. We'd urge Government to sit down with the education union to strike a deal," Ms Crowle said.
"Over the next few months, parents and students can expect:
- Half-day strikes in Labor seats, including that of Mr Brumby, Skills Minister Jacinta Allan, Children's Minister Maxine Morand and Agriculture Minister Joe Helper.
- Principals to conduct work bans, such as refusing to attend Education Department briefings or comply with key government priorities, in their own push for more money.
- Catholic school teachers, who are negotiating a wage deal with church employers that depends on what public school counterparts get, to go on strike on March 7.
"Union figures suggest that some schools will effectively be closed today because of the strike. Others will run some classes on reduced staff, including Craigieburn Secondary College (years 7 and 12 classes only), Fawkner Secondary College (year 7 classes only) and Essendon Primary School (two classes only).
"Mr Brumby said inflationary pressures and Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's call for wage restraint meant the Government had to be economically responsible and seek a result that was in the public interest.
"You've got the Prime Minister who's asking for wage restraint right across Australia, so we've got to take all of those things into account, and make sure too that we continue to support the best staffed school system anywhere in Australia," Mr Brumby said.
"Teachers want a 10% annual pay rise, but the Government's offer is for 3.25%, with anything above that to be met by productivity trade-offs such as changes to holiday time and pupil-free training days.
"Talks between teachers and the Government have been suspended since the end of last year, with the union refusing to resume talks unless Education Minister Bronwyn Pike meets them directly. But Ms Pike argues that it is up to her department to negotiate a new agreement.
"Union branch president Mary Bluett said teachers had no choice but to continue striking, given the minister's refusal to negotiate. Teachers walked off the job this month and on November 21."
From The Age at link
- Op Ed
Choice is all very well, but not at the expense of education
by Irfan Yusuf (a Sydney lawyer who has advised and represented independent schools in workplace relations matters)
"Yesterday's Age reported that more than 200,000 children — almost 40% of non-government school students — attended a religious school outside the main Catholic, Anglican and Uniting systems. Some are taught creationism as part of their science studies. A teacher at one small Christian school was quoted as saying that evolution was taught as a theory. This is exactly how I was taught about evolution by my year 9 science teacher at a Sydney Anglican school...
"Mismanagement is not necessarily the norm for newly established schools, and not all students from these schools graduate as social misfits. But the reality is that the Commonwealth Government has thrown money at community-based schools managed by devout and sincere people with little or no educational credentials or experience. The community may be paying too high a price for a small minority of parents to exercise choice in their children's education."
- The Monday Education Section has been updated and includes 13 stories [two of which were included in yesterday's news coverage]
- The West Australian
- Teachers to strike tomorrow [12:00 noon online update]
by Flip Prior and Bethany Hiatt
"Teachers across WA will strike tomorrow after an exhaustive meeting of the State School Teachers Union this morning."Officials from the union emerged shortly after midday and held a press conference a short time ago.
"State School Teachers Union president Anne Gisborne said after due and considered deliberations, which included receiving reports and getting legal advice, the executive decided they would proceed with the strike.“The directors too will still be in operation and our members will be rallying around in metropolitan areas and country areas tomorrow morning as per directed to,” Ms Gisborne said.
"She said it was incredibly important for members to be able to speak directly to negotiators and senior officers for a clear explanation about why negotiations have been delayed.
“The fact (is) that we haven’t got a satisfactory offer on the table now, 10 weeks after our members significantly rejected this second offer in early December,” she said.
"Ms Gisborne said the executive also accepted the risk of possible de-registration.
“Certainly we will be appealing to the parents to have consideration for the seriousness of this action that we are taking. We do not take it lightly.”
"Ms Gisborne said a resolution was needed immediately, not just to ease the current dispute but also to prevent future teacher shortages.
“Our members of course will always consider the opportunity to undertake further industrial action if there is not satisfactory progress in negotiations.”
"Ms Gisborne said the union wanted WA’s teachers to be the highest paid in Australia as they worked hard and the impact of the cost of living was way beyond what was occurring in the east.
“That is what we’re attempting to achieve and nothing less than that will satisfy us.”
“Salary is one way to attract and to retain teachers.”
"Minutes before the union meeting ended, the Education Department invited officials to a 2pm meeting. The officials were planning to attend the meeting." [emphasis added]
From The West Australian online at link
‘Stay in the classroom’: McGowan [2:00 pm online update]
by Stuart McKinnon and Flip Prior
"WA Education Minister Mark McGowan has urged teachers to break the strike action called by their union and attend their schools and teach tomorrow morning."Mr McGowan made the comments earlier this afternoon while slamming the executive of the State School Teachers’ Union for ignoring the direction of the WA Industrial Relations Commission and directing teachers to strike for half a day tomorrow.
"Earlier today, the union executive agreed that the half-day strike would go ahead despite the commission’s order on Monday that it abandon the planned industrial action.
"Mr McGowan said the union was choosing to disrupt children’s education across the State with its actions and that it was acting in bad faith.
“Unions always say we need an independent umpire and that (both parties) must abide by the umpire’s decision – the union has chosen to ignore this,” he said.
"Mr McGowan said the government wanted to pay teachers well and reward them but believed their union was acting irresponsibly.
“We put up a $685 million offer last year which would have seen the average classroom teacher paid $84,300 before allowances,” he said. [You bloody liar, McGowan! Web]
“This would see WA teachers being among the best paid in the country.”
"Mr McGowan said the government was committed to continuing negotiations and finding a resolution to the dispute.
"Thewest.com.au understands that a planned meeting to discuss the pay offer between the Department of Education and the union executive for 2pm today was called off within minutes of the union’s announcement to push ahead with industrial action.
"Earlier today, State School Teachers Union president Anne Gisborne said after due and considered deliberations, which included receiving reports and getting legal advice, the executive had decided it would proceed with the strike.
“The directors too will still be in operation and our members will be rallying around in metropolitan areas and country areas tomorrow morning as per directed to,” Ms Gisborne said.
"She said it was incredibly important for members to be able to speak directly to negotiators and senior officers for a clear explanation about why negotiations have been delayed.
“The fact (is) that we haven’t got a satisfactory offer on the table now, 10 weeks after our members significantly rejected this second offer in early December,” she said.
"Ms Gisborne said the executive also accepted the risk of possible de-registration
“Certainly we will be appealing to the parents to have consideration for the seriousness of this action that we are taking. We do not take it lightly.”
"Ms Gisborne said a resolution was needed immediately, not just to ease the current dispute but also to prevent future teacher shortages.
“Our members of course will always consider the opportunity to undertake further industrial action if there is not satisfactory progress in negotiations.”
"Ms Gisborne said the union wanted WA’s teachers to be the highest paid in Australia as they worked hard and the impact of the cost of living was way beyond what was occurring in the east.
“That is what we’re attempting to achieve and nothing less than that will satisfy us.”
“Salary is one way to attract and to retain teachers.”
From The West Australian online at link
- Schools could close if teachers go on strike (page 3)
by Tiffany Laurie"Principals have been given the power to close their schools tomorrow as the State School Teachers Union maintained its refusal to automatically comply with a WA Industrial Relations Commission order to call off planned industrial action.
"In a backdown from its directive that all children should be sent to school despite the planned half-day strike, the Department of Education and Training yesterday authorised principals to decide how their schools would operate after the union refused to cancel the action.
"The union's executive will meet this morning to vote on whether to continue with the stop-work meeting, which was organised in support of a campaign for a 20 per cent pay increase over three years.
"The SSTU was ordered on Monday to abandon the strike at the conclusion of a conciliation conference between the union and the department, saying industrial action was not in the public interest while negotiations were taking place. If it fails to comply, the SSTU could face deregistration and fines.
"Under the directive, the department and the SSTU was required to hold more talks this week to negotiate terms of a new agreement and report back to the WAIRC on Friday.
"A SSTU spokesman said the senior union officers had legal advice about the strike, but a decision on whether to continue had to be made by the full executive council when it met today.
"At this stage the directive (to stop work) stands," he said.
"Education Department director-general Sharyn O'Neill said she authorised principals to act because of the SSTU's failure to immediately abide by the WAIRC order, but student attendance would be expected in the morning if the strike was cancelled. She criticised the union for being "distracted" by its proposed industrial action instead of negotiating a compromise.
"Parents urgently need to know what is going to happen at their schools on Thursday and principals are in the best position to give them advice based on local circumstances," she said.
"If the union and its members decide to abide by the commission's ruling, then I fully expect all students will be able to attend school on Thursday morning."
"Principals warned that they feared students' safety would be compromised and children would not be supervised adequately tomorrow morning if most teachers attended the rally."
From The West Australian
- Parents eye scholarships, rush tutors (page 49)
by Bethany Hiatt"Parents desperate to avoid troubled State schools but who can't afford to pay full price at costly private colleges are shelling out up to $500 for extra tuition to prepare their children for scholarship exams.
"Tutoring firms say parents are flocking to enrol their children in scholarship preparation sessions to boost their scores in entry exams for private schools or selective State schools, which are held between March and May each year.
"The number of children applying for scholarships in on the rise. The Australian Council for Education Research, which designs most of the tests used for ranking top students, said 31 WA private schools were now using their scholarship programmes for Year 8 entry.
"A spokeswoman said that nearly 2000 WA students took the tests last year. "The number appears to be increasing each year," she said.
"Victoria Carlton, from the International Centre for Excellence in Bayswater, said she had noticed a big increase in the past three years in the number of parents paying $50 a session for 10-week tuition courses to prepare for scholarship tests.
"I think that they associate higher academic standards and more pastoral care with the private schools," she said. "And obviously finances area concern and they're trying to ensure that the family is able to bear the costs of what is going to come up ahead of them."
"But A1 Learning Academy owner Julia Gilmore, who operates in the northern suburbs, said she had an equal number of enquiries from parents wanting their children prepared for selective State school entry tests as well as private school scholarship exams.
"Each year I'm getting more and more inquiries for children wanting help," she said.
"Ms. Gilmore stressed that tutoring would only help children prepare for the exam format used in the ranking tests. It would not develop the skills they needed to excel. "The child needs natural aptitude - you can't turn a child into a genius by preparing them," she said.
"Claremont owner of Clever Kids Education Centre Matteo Pantalone said he had a steady stream of students wanting short-term scholarship preparation for Perth Modern, WA's only academically selective State School, and local private schools such as Methodist Ladies' College and Christ Church Grammar.
"There are things the children can do just to maximise the score they can get," he said. "That includes things like time management, how to tackle multiple choice, how to use information on the page."
"Scholarships at the most expensive private schools are worth up to half-tuition fees, which are about $15,000 a year. For five years of secondary education, this amounts to more than $37,000.
"Up to 30 of the highest ranked applicants to Perth Modern will be awarded $3000 academic excellence scholarships."
From The West Australian
- Letter to the Editor (page 23)
- Teacher's pay
"Premier Alan Carpenter said in your report (26/2) that the pay offer would make WA teachers the highest paid in Australia.
"The facts are that the top of the teacher scale will not make them the best paid in Australia (especially considering the higher costs of living in our golden State).
"Administrators and especially teaching administrators at the department's own admission are below most educators in the same roles across our nation. The department's "generous" pay offer will see them slip further behind while they are called on to do much more with fewer resources at school level.
"There is a huge divide between the reality of the crisis in teaching in this State and what the bureaucrats and politicians believe to be the case. The reality is that teachers have had enough - their pay has been neglected for many years and they want to receive a professional salary for the important work they do. If it takes strike action for the Government to acknowledge that, so be it.
"Finally a question for Mr. Carpenter: if things are so good for teachers, why is he keeping the Twomey taskforce report into teaching in this state a secret?"
Andrew Bell, Woodvale
- ABC News
- Director General "disappointed" by teachers' action
"The Director General of Education has been highly critical of the teachers' union for defying an Industrial Relations Commission order and recommending its members stop work tomorrow."The State School Teachers Union met for several hours this morning and decided to go ahead with the strike.
"It faces possible deregistration for defying the order.
"The Director General of Education, Sharyn O'Neill, says individual principals are deciding whether their schools will open
"Ms O'Neill says she's extremely disappointed as the parties have been meeting weekly to negotiate a pay deal.
"She says, last year, the department offered the best pay deal for state school teachers in WA's history.
"The Opposition Leader Troy Buswell has refused to say whether he supports the teachers union's decision.
"I understand the frustration that the teacher's union and teachers of WA are feeling," he said."
From ABC News at link
- 46 schools closed by stop-work
"More than 40 schools in Western Australia will be closed on Thursday because of industrial action by teachers."The teachers have defied an order by the Industrial Relations Commission and are attending a stop work meeting in the morning run by their union.
"The State Government says teachers who take part will have their pay docked.
"The teachers are expected to return to work after lunch.
"The Education Department has released the following list of schools which will be closed:-
Metropolitan:-
1. East Wanneroo PS
2. Thornlie PS
3. Lake Gwelup PS
4. Glendane PS
5. Dudley Park PS
6. Dianella Heights PS
7. Mount Helena PS
8. Medina PS
9. Koorana Education Support Centre
10. Safety Bay PS
11. Rockingham SHS
12. Language Development Centre Bungaree
13. Cannington Community College
14. Cannington Education Support Centre
15. Clayton View PS
16. Guildford PS
17. Lockridge PS
18. West Beechboro PS
19. South Fremantle SHS
20. Riverton PS
21. Riverton Education Support
22. Coolbellup Learning Centre
23. Bull Creek PS
24. Sorrento PSCountry:-
1. North Albany SHS
2. Allanson PS
3. Fitzroy Crossing DHS
4. La Grange RCS
5. Roebuck PS
6. Mullewa DHS
7. Meekatharra DHS
8. John Willcock College
9. Dongara DHS
10. Narrogin PS
11. Augusta PS
12. Karratha ESC
13. Cassia ESC
14. Dampier PS
15. Millars Well PS
16. Karratha SHS
17. Wickham PS
18. Baler PS
19. Cassia PS
20. Hedland SHS
21. Tom Price SHS
22. South Newman PS
From ABC News at link
- Teachers defy IRC
"The State School Teachers Union will defy an order by the Industrial Relations Commission and push ahead with a stop work meeting tomorrow."The Commission found the half day stop work meeting was not in the public interest and ordered the union to abandon the plan.
"The union met for several hours this morning and decided to go ahead with it.
"It faces possible penalties, including deregistration, for defying the order.
"The union's president Anne Gisborne is urging parents not to send their children to school tomorrow.
"We would certainly be calling on parents to consider what's happening at a school site and to consider showing support for our action by keeping children at home for the morning," she said.
"The Education Minister, Mark McGowan has described the teachers' move as irresponsible.
"I'm very disappointed that the School Teachers Union has decided to ignore the order of the Industrial Relations Commission by proceeding with their strike tomorrow morning," he said.
"This will inconvenience families, it will hurt children's education and it shows bad faith."
From ABC News at link
- The Sunday Times Online / PerthNow
- Teachers emergency meeting [late 26 Feb update]
by Paul Lampathakis
"The WA State School Teachers Union will hold an emergency meeting tomorrow morning to decide whether to strike on Thursday."But pay negotiations between the union and the Education department have stalled while the union examines its legal options, after the WA Industrial Relations Commission yesterday ordered that it abandon the planned half-day strike.
"President Anne Gisborne said executive members from around WA would attend tomorrow's meeting between 9am and noon to discuss the union's options about the commission ruling, including whether to seek leave to appeal it.
"The commission has said the strike was not in the public interest.
"As discussions between the parties to finalise the terms of a new agreement were still ongoing, the foreshadowed industrial action should not take place,'' a statement from the commission said.
"Ms Gisborne said a pay negotiation meeting with the department scheduled for tomorrow would not be held because of the need to deal with the commission matters.
"She expected such a meeting would be re-scheduled for later in the week because the commission had asked that negotiations progress before both parties return to the commission on Friday." [emphasis added]
From The Sunday Times Online / PerthNow at link
- The Age
- Brumby refuses to join table as the teacher strikes roll on
by Bridie Smith and David Rood
"Premier John Brumby yesterday rejected a call from the teachers' union to personally intervene in wage negotiations, despite the threat of a further two months of strikes.
"As up to 600 teachers from Maribyrnong, Broadmeadows, Sunbury and Melton rallied outside Mr Brumby's Glenroy office yesterday, the Premier and Education Minister Bronwyn Pike ruled out sitting down with the teachers' union to negotiate a new enterprise agreement.
"Mr Brumby, who was touring the new Royal Women's Hospital while the teachers protested outside his suburban office, said attending the negotiations would set an unsustainable precedent."If you do that, then every single industrial issue or EBA that comes up before Government, people expect the minister or the Premier to be there and it's just not practical or realistic to believe that that could be the case," he said.
"Around 150 schools were disrupted yesterday and a further 200 teachers protested outside Labor MP Joanne Duncan's Gisborne office.
"Yesterday's stop work — the third in as many months — kicked off a series of 35 rolling regional stoppages that will continue throughout the state until April 23. This morning, schools in Bendigo, Castlemaine, Kyneton and Maryborough will be disrupted as up to 400 teachers stop work. Tomorrow, the stoppages will target eastern metropolitan schools in areas such as Doncaster, Nunawading and Waverley, as well as east Gippsland.
"We need the intervention of the Premier," Australian Education Union Victorian branch president Mary Bluett said. "To end this dispute, come to the negotiating table in good faith and resolve the issues that are affecting the capacity of Victoria to attract and retain qualified, quality teachers."
"She said teachers, who have not had a pay rise since October 2006 and are asking for a 30% rise over three years, were striking as a last resort.
"The only course we have now is industrial action, which highlights to the community what is happening in our schools and the difficulty we are having in ensuring qualified teachers."
"Ms Bluett said Victorian teachers were the lowest paid in Australia, with those at the top of the scale receiving 15% — or nearly $10,000 — less per year than their NSW counterparts.
"She said teachers were angry and frustrated, with no move on the Government offer of 3.25% since negotiations began more than a year ago. Talks between the union and the Government broke down last November. The previous enterprise agreement expired last August.
"The result of the state school teachers' wage deal will influence Catholic teachers, who are due to strike on Friday, March 7.
"Victorian Independent Education Union general secretary Deb James said the action would be widespread. "The people who come to the table need to be authorised to move and if that means that Minister Pike or the Premier himself should be at the table, then so be it."
From The Age at link
Angry about their wages, hundreds of teachers protest outside Premier John Brumby's electorate office in Glenroy yesterday.
Photo: Jason South © The Age
- The Australian
- Op Ed
Literacy taught by illiterates
by Christopher Bantick
"It is not just this newspaper that is questioned by Ilana Snyder over its position on literacy. In her book The Literacy Wars: Why Teaching Children to Read and Write is a Battleground in Australia, I am cited several times, and not because I have written on this page. I do hold the view that literacy can be taught with rigour and tested forperformance.
"Snyder suggests: "It was the Murdoch paper's crusade against contemporary approaches to literacy education that motivated me to write the book. In recent years, The Australian's in-house opinion shapers have been accorded astonishing privilege and power. Their goal has been to dictate a reactionary model for the secondary-school curriculum. It is time to hold them to account." But while Snyder can attempt to marginalise The Australian's role in the literacy debate, this is misleading.
'"t is not my intention to examine and dismiss Snyder's often fatuous, niggardly arguments in her intemperate book. The point here about Snyder and fellow travellers who endorse the view that literacy is an experience rather than a learned discipline is that opposition of any kind - call it conservatism - is ridiculed. It is a neat ploy to say that the so-called Right, for which this newspaper is supposedly a mouthpiece, is narrow and prescriptive in its appreciation of literacy. The enemy has been identified. Meanwhile, those on the Left are expansive, welcome new ideas, are progressive and embrace theory. But this is a deceptive argument.
"Literacy transcends the Right or Left positions. It is critics such as Snyder who wish to reduce it to the old Left-Right debate. Moreover, if opinion is even marginally conservative, it is immediately treated as suspect.
"The problem with Snyder's reductive argument is that she denies the reality that literacy education in Australia is in serious trouble. There are many children who cannot read, write, spell, understand grammar, construct a clear sentence and punctuate with meaning. The reason is palpably obvious.
"The students accepted into university teaching courses are often simply the leavings, the lees if you like, after the better students have opted to undertake more prestigious and ambitious degrees. One has only to look at the entrance scores for teaching, some as low as 56, to see that high-flyers are not entering the classroom. The result is teachers who are not proficient in literacy are teaching children. Is it any wonder that Australia is producing illiterate children when they are taught by illiterates? It is for this reason that the NSW Government has introduced tests for five-year-olds in literacy and numeracy from this year in an attempt to head off early learning difficulties. It makes sense.
"The reality is that literacy instruction in Australia has been of questionable quality for decades. It is also easy to trace the decline in proficiency to the introduction of progressive, child-centred, jargon-based theory that took over many Australian classrooms during the 1970s. What Snyder and the strident voices of the Left do not grasp, or seem to care about, is that if children are not taught literacy, then they are effectively disenfranchised for life. [emphasis added]
"Recent research by Australian National University economists Andrew Leigh and Chris Ryan, entitled How Has School Productivity Changed in Australia, points out that today's teenagers are less literate than those of the '60s. The reason is simple: poor teaching.
"While Kevin Rudd makes much of his so-called education revolution, which is supposedly going to leap off a laptop keyboard, he has been noticeably silent on the much harder question: will the federal Government be insistent that schools lift their literacy standards?
"Before the election, Rudd promised to publish primary and secondary school results in reading and writing and numeracy in years three, five and nine. Earlier this month Deputy Prime Minister and Education Minister Julia Gillard, when referring to the national action plan for literacy and numeracy, said: "The Rudd Government understands that literacy and numeracy are the building blocks of a good education." Well, prove it.
"The Rudd Government needs the will and preparedness to take on the entrenched interests in university education departments that work against structured, phonetically based language instruction. It should expose where literacy instruction is deficient and take necessary remedial action.
"This can be measured by a published state-by-state, school-by-school comparison. But these results should not ossify hidden in some departmental journal but be published in newspapers, much as the Year 12 results and school rankings are done in Victoria.
"It will soon become evident why it is that some schools in the same socioeconomic band, with the same cohort of children, are doing better than others. This does two things: expose the schools and expose deficient teachers.
"While Snyder's book will be welcomed by the literacy luvvies as a justification for their failure to instruct children properly, the truth is that the Left resists accountability. Do parents really care about the literacy wars? Hardly. They just want their children to learn to read and write."
Christopher Bantick is a Melbourne writer and education commentator.
From The Australian at link
- Public school students missing out on uni offers
Public school students are those most likely to miss out on a university education as competition for places intensifies. More applications for fewer tertiary spots at Melbourne's prestigious universities have led to government school leavers and poor students being pushed out of the second-tier universities.
- Larkins calls for right to set fees
The HECS loan system should be deregulated and universities should be free to set student fees for degrees, prominent [Monash] vice-chancellor Richard Larkins says.
Similar story in The Age
- The West Australian
- Parents warned at last minute: keep kids home [Front Page Headline]
by Bethany Hiatt and Gabrielle Knowles"Hundreds of principals around the State yesterday appealed to parents to keep their children away from school this morning amid union expectations that at least half WA's public school teachers would strike until about 11.30am over pay claims.
"Most schools are expected to remain open but have encouraged parents wherever possible to keep their children home so they don't over burden the extremely limited staff.
"Principals contacted by The West Australian said they warned parents in a letter sent home with students yesterday that the school could not guarantee students' safety or that children would receive the required duty of care. They therefore requested the parents where possible to keep children home in the morning.
"The Department of Education and Training said that by late yesterday, 46 of its 770 schools had advised that they would not open today.
"The department defended itself against accusations that it gave parents virtually no notice of the strike, saying the State School Teachers Union confirmed its plans only yesterday.
"But it is understood principals polled teachers as early as Tuesday on whether they would join the strike, though teachers were under no obligation to say whether they planned to attend the rallies.
"The union decided at noon yesterday that it would defy an order from the WA Industrial Relations Commission on Monday to abandon the strike.
"SSTU president Anne Gisborne said the Government had misread the feeling among teachers and the public and would not rule out more action.
"She said WA teachers would be satisfied with nothing less than being the highest-paid teachers in the nation.
"Education director-general Sharyn O'Neill back-tracked on her initial guarantee to parents that all schools would remain open today and instead delegated all decisions on how to manage the strike to principals.
"If a principal makes a judgment that the safety of the students cannot be guaranteed and the school has little or no option but to close, the principal may use his or her authority under Regulation 82 of the School Education Act to temporarily close the school for Tuesday [sic] morning," she said in an email sent to schools yesterday.
"Principals were also directed to display notices prominently on school premises advising parents if the school was closed.
"Many principals said yesterday they feared they would battle to supervise students, with uncertainty over how many students or teachers would arrive this morning.
"South Fremantle Senior High School will be closed until 11.35am but most of the 21 schools contacted by The West Australian said they would remain open, though principals said they were concerned about the care they could provide.
"A northern suburbs primary school principal who did not want named, said he advised parents to keep children at home because only two of the school's 30-plus teachers would be at work. "I can't guarantee the children's safety," he said.
"Most other schools said they would be open but warned parents that supervision could be minimal. Gooseberry Hill Primary School principal Patrick Bourke said: "I (told them I) would have concerns about the duty-of-care that we could provide, but should children turn up they will be supervised," he said.
"Rossmoyne Primary School principal Geoff Anderson said there would be "limited numbers on deck" expecting more than 80 per cent of the 27 teachers to be absent.
"Other principals refused to tell The West Australian their plans, saying they were to direct all inquiries to district offices. But an Education Department spokesman denied all principals had been gagged.
"Education Minister Mark McGowan accused the union of being irresponsible by ignoring the WAIRC order. "This will inconvenience families, it will hurt children's education and it shows bad faith," he said.
"Commission registrar John Spurling said it may launch an investigation into whether the union had defied the order not to strike. Penalties could range from an undertaking not to repeat the action, a $2000 fine or an appearance before the full bench to explain why the union should not be deregistered."
From The West Australian
- Schools to be closed today [list]
- Teachers’ union warns of more strikes [online update at 1:45 pm]
AAP
"The WA State School Teachers’ Union has not ruled out more strike action despite teachers returning to work this afternoon after a stop-work meeting this morning."More than 6500 teachers stopped work to hold meetings at Langley Park and regional areas, forcing the closure of 46 schools across the state.
"The union defied an order by the WA Industrial Relations Commission (IRC) not to strike."The teachers have rejected the State Government’s offer of a 13 per cent pay rise and are pushing for a 20 per cent rise.
"Teachers’ union president Anne Gisborne said the union would meet the Department of Education and Training tomorrow morning and report back to the IRC tomorrow afternoon."
From The West Australian online at link
- Push for children to stay home as strike hits schools [online update at 6:50 am]
by Karen Hodge, Bethany Hiatt, Gabrielle Knowles and Joseph Cantanzaro
"Industrial action by teachers will today force the closure of more than 40 schools, with dozens more principals urging parents to keep their children home today."State School Teachers Union members will attend stop work meetings across the State this morning as their bid for more pay intensifies.
"Most schools will remain open, but principals have urged parents to keep their children home where possible to limit the burden on limited staff.
"The Department of Education and Training was advised by late yesterday that 46 of its 770 schools would not open today. Of those, 24 are in the metropolitan area, and the total number includes education support and language development centres.
"At Cannington Senior High School, a lone traffic warden has been sitting beside the road just in case any students arrived.
"A mother arrived at the school with two children, but said she would not be leaving them at the school.
"Peta Pavlinovich, 33, said she agreed with the teachers’ strike as she dropped her four-year-old Thomas off at Wembley’s Lake Monger Primary School for kindergarten.
“I agree with it,” Ms Pavlinovich said. “I’m actually an ex teacher. It’s inconvenient for the parents, but I can understand why they’re doing it. It’s a hard job.
“It’s probably more upsetting for the kids than the parents.”
"Principal Jen Graffin said although only one teacher from Lake Monger attended the rally and it was business as usual at the school, confusion caused by media reports of today’s strike action meant that not all the students had shown up."
From The West Australian online at link
- Alston (page 20)
© The West Australian
Letters to the Editor (page 22)
A lengthy letter from Ray Dalin, CEO of a Christian school, concerning the highlights of Labor's perceived hidden agendas for a particular segment of the education market and the concern that Julia Gillard misunderstands the religious schools and their role in society.
A letter from Greg Hurn, Thornlie, concerning views of Professor McGaw, head of the National Curriculum Board, seeing the worst issue is education in Australia being some schools are teaching students to abstain from sexual activity before marriage and about creation (report, 25/2).
- ABC News
- 5,000 teachers attend stop work meeting
"More then 5,000 teachers have attended a stop work meeting at Langley Park in Perth to demand better salaries and conditions."Public school teachers defied an Industrial Relations Commission ruling not to attend the rally.
"Teachers from the regional areas of Kalgoorlie, Albany, Port Hedland, Broome and Kununurra have travelled to Perth to take part in the meeting.
"The President of the State School Teachers Union, Anne Gisborne, has demanded the release of a key report into teacher shortages.
"She says the report was written last year by a taskforce chaired by former Curtin University Vice Chancellor Lance Twoomey.
"The teachers also voted to take further industrial action if the State Government does not address their concerns over pay and conditions.
"Resolutions passed at the meeting include:
1. The SSTU and its members strongly condemn the Premier Mr Alan Carpenter, the Treasurer Mr Eric Ripper, the Minister for Education Mr Mark McGowan for failing to respond adequately and in a timely manner to the SSTUWA members' rejection of the"2nd Offer".
2. The SSTU and its members call upon the Minister for Education, Mark McGowan to release the TwoomeyTaskforce Report into teacher shortages as an act of good faith with teachers and the community and to inform the negotiations.
3. The SSTU and its members draws the conclusion of the Carpenter Government their serious concerns that a failure to provide decent salaries and decent working conditions for teachers in the 2008 EBA will risk the future of our students, our communities children and a failure to address the teacher supply.
8. The members of the SSTUWA fully support and endorse further industrial action as required if the Government does not respond in a timely and adequate manner to concerns raised by the SSTUWA in relation to the negotiations of the schools EBA 2008 and progression of the Union's log of claims."
From ABC News at link
Teachers attending a meeting in Perth raise their hands to support taking further industrial action as part of a push for better pay and conditions.
© ABC News
- Union attacked by premier, minister
"The State Government has accused the State School Teachers Union of being "irresponsible" and of acting illegally by striking today over a pay and conditions dispute."About 7,000 teachers attended rallies across the state this morning in defiance of an Industrial Relations Commission order.
"The Premier Alan Carpenter expressed his concern in Parliament, saying the industrial action was illegal and would encourage parents to take their children out of public schools.
"The Education Department says 70 per cent of teachers turned up at school about 35 per cent of students attended.
"The Education Minister Mark McGowan says the low student turnout was due to the union's scare tactics.
"The teachers union scaremongered, they put it out there that they thought that parents shouldn't send their children to school."
"That scaremongering worked."
Union says pay offer is an insult
"The State School Teachers Union has threatened further industrial action if the government fails to negotiate improved pay and conditions.
"At this morning's rally in Perth, the union President Anne Gisborne described the Government's pay offer as an insult .
"At the end of a year blighted by teacher shortages the minister saw fit to deliver an offer with the first salary increase in 2009, " she said."
From ABC News at link
About 7,000 teachers attended rallies across the state this morning in defiance of an Industrial Relations Commission order.
© ABC News
- Education Department defends handling of teacher dispute
"The Director General of Education, Sharyn O'Neill, has defended her department's negotiations over a pay dispute with teachers."Public school teachers have decided to defy an Industrial Relations Commission ruling not to attend a stop work meeting today which will be held at Langely Park on the Perth foreshore.
"Ms O'Neill says student safety will be put first as teachers attend the meeting.
"The dispute has forced the closure of 46 schools and many more will operate on skeleton staff.
"Ms O'Neill says her department has been negotiating in good faith with the teachers for six months.
"It was a good deal, now that was rejected, and we have points of difference, that happens, I understand that," she said.
"We've met weekly and we intended to meet weekly to resolve the points of difference, so we've been bargaining in good faith.
"I've asked the union to come back to the table and get on with it."
From ABC News at link
- Premier denounces teachers' stop-work
"The Premier Alan Carpenter has condemned the State School Teachers Union, saying its actions today will encourage more parents to desert the public education system."Earlier today, schools across the state were disrupted when thousands of teachers followed a union directive to attend a half-day stop work meeting at Langley Park.
"The Government estimates 7,000 teachers took part. 46 schools had to close.
"Mr Carpenter has told parliament the union is acting against the best interests of the public education system.
"The current attitude of the executive of the State School Teachers Union will encourage parents to take their children out of Government schools," he said.
"It will discourage people from going into teaching as a profession per se, and particularly in the public sector, and that is against the best interest of their members."
From ABC News at link
The premier has told parliament today's stop-work meeting by teachers was against the best interests of the public education system.
© ABC News
- Teachers back after stop-work
"Teachers have returned to classes after their union rally this morning."Thousands of teachers attended a stop-work meeting at Langley Park in Perth and others in the regions monitored the rally online.
"The teachers say they want better pay and conditions and are hoping this morning's rally will prompt the State Government to table another offer.
"Primary School Teacher Karen Williams was at the rally and says many are leaving the profession because of the poor work conditions.
"Teachers are walking off the job because of the conditions, we are losing teachers, wonderfully professional teachers and I think it's time that something has to be done," she said."
From ABC News at link
WA teachers have returned to classes after their union rally this morning.
© ABC News
- An Open Letter to the Premier
- Dear Alan
I used to respect you and I believed that you would be a good Labor Premier for WA.
I have changed my mind.
You may have noticed that over 90% of those teachers who voted rejected the pay offer that was made to them in December.
You may have noticed the thousands of teachers who stopped work and attended meetings around the State today.
You may have even read the resolutions that were passed at the meetings.
Teachers are expressing their dissatisfaction with your Government and with those who are allegedly leading the public education system in this State. We are doing so collectively through our Union. Teachers who support public education are the strongest supporters of the SSTUWA.
The damage to public education has been done by our political leaders (State and Federal) and by those who lead the DET bureaucracy in WA.
We are told that we are living in one of the greatest booms in our history. We have rich public resources going into private hands. Our economy is well in the black. You claim that we have a world class education system.
It is time to offer teachers decent salaries commensurate with their qualifications and experience; the difficulty and complexity of the work they do, often in trying conditions; and the value of that work to the social good.
Alan, at the moment it is you, not the Union and not teachers, who is doing the real damage to public education in WA.
Your former admirer
From the PLATO Forum
SET
- The Sydney Morning Herald
- Black scheme for whites
Negligent parents in Western Australia will be the first non-indigenous people to experience the type of welfare quarantining used as part of the intervention into Northern Territory indigenous communities...
The West Australian Government has agreed to the scheme in some areas, including the Kimberley. All indigenous people living in remote communities and some towns of the Northern Territory have had their payments quarantined as part of the intervention.
- Teachers take bullying claim to commission
Staff at the Conservatorium High School claim the Department of Education has failed to protect them from bullying.
- The Australian
- Schoolkids 'should be given own laptops'
An international education consultant says the Rudd Government's promised computer revolution in schools will not work unless each student is given a laptop - with wireless internet capability - they can take home.
- Parents urged to keep kids from school
AAP
"Western Australia's state school teachers will hold a stop-work meeting today in defiance of an Industrial Relations Commission (IRC) order.
"Most schools are likely to stay open but some principals have urged parents to keep their children at home to minimise pressure on skeleton staffing levels.
"The Department of Education and Training (DET) has indicated 46 of the state's 770 schools will be closed, including 24 in the Perth metropolitan area.
"The State Schools Teachers Union of WA (SSTUWA) yesterday voted to ignore the IRC order and hold a stop-work meeting today as it pushes for a 20 per cent pay rise for its members.
"The union has rejected the offer of a 13 per cent pay rise by the WA government.
"On Monday, the IRC ruled that a strike was not in the public interest because negotiations were ongoing.
"The IRC has ordered that the union and DET are required to hold further discussions this week to negotiate terms of a new agreement and report back to the commission on Friday."
From The Australian at link
- Letter to the Editor
- Great savings to be had in cutting unis
"Oh my! all this stuff about tertiary education.
"Start with the question: do we need 38 universities? Must we have 30 law schools, 38 faculties of arts, 38 schools of foreign language, 38 schools of politics and economics in 38 faculties of commerce, 30 departments of journalism and communication, 38 departments of English, umpteen schools of women studies, of Aboriginal culture, of fine arts and music?
"Take politics courses in Melbourne, Monash, La Trobe. They are a few kilometers from each other. Couldn't they merge?
"Methinks vice-chancellors are preserving their own turf, building their separate empires.
"Entirely wasteful. Great savings to be had from specialising the tertiary sector! TAFEs too? And call them Colleges of Commerce and Technology (CCTs) to take the stigma out of them.
"Students will need to travel and live a collegiate life; which was the original philosophy of “universitas”.
"Wouldn't standards be raised? Back to the days of glory, when a bachelor's degree was worth something, a masters was next to God, and a doctorate was proof of infallibility."
Frank Hainsworth, Gold Coast, Qld
- The Age
- Unis slam abolition of full fees
Victorian universities have taken a swipe at the Rudd Government's plan to abolish full-fee places for Australian students, describing it as a costly move that will force possible staff cuts and greater reliance on international students.
- The West Australian
- Union hurting State schools: Carpenter [Front Page Headline]
by Bethany Hiatt"The teachers' strike which yesterday resulted in more than half of WA's public schools taking at least half the day off, encouraged parents to send their children to private schools and discouraged people from becoming teachers, Alan Carpenter said yesterday.
"Launching a stinging attack on the State School Teachers' Union in Parliament, the Premier said the decision to go ahead with yesterday's strike in defiance of the WA Industrial Relations Commission's ruling was an "act of gross irresponsibility".
"He said the teachers' union executive was plagued by internal problems and its unjustified tactics would ultimately backfire to everyone's detriment.
"There is an internal problem within the executive of the teachers' union, they find it very, very difficult to come to an agreement on anything because they've got strongly opposed groups of people," he said.
"The current attitude of the executive … will encourage parents to take their children out of government schools, it will discourage people from going into teaching as a profession, particularly in the public sector, and this against the best interests of their members, against the best interests of everybody."
"His criticism came as the union warned parents to brace for more strikes as the campaign for higher wages rolled on.
"We could have a similar activity as we have today," union president Anne Gisborne said. "We might end up with longer-term type strike action, we'll certainly look much closer at activities such as disengagement from reporting processes and so on."
"Thousands of teachers around the State abandoned their schools to take part in a stop-work meeting at Langley Park. The move prompted the WA Industrial Relations Commission, which on Monday directed teachers not to strike, to say it would investigate whether yesterday's action had broken the law.
"The teachers voted to support further industrial action, which could include rolling full-day strikes within weeks. Waving school banners and placards, they called for the immediate release of a Government report on the teacher shortage, which was completed two months ago.
"They also condemned Mr Carpenter, Treasurer Eric Ripper and Education Minister Mark McGowan for failing to respond adequately to teachers' rejection of the second pay offer of at least 13 per cent over three years. Ms Gisborne said teachers were pushing for "20 per cent plus".
"The union estimated that more than 6000 people were at Langley Park and that a further 2000 country teachers were on strike. But education director-general Sharyn O'Neill said only about 7000 teachers were absent from schools.
"The department said about 137,000 students, or 55 per cent of its 247,000 students, were absent. "I'd certainly be disappointed if there was more disruption planned for students in this State," Ms O'Neill said.
"She would not say when the department would put a third offer to the union. "I don't want to speculate how long these pay negotiations are going to take," she said.
"SSTU general secretary David Kelly told the rally that the Government's "bully boy tactics" of taking the union to the WAIRC instead of putting a decent offer on the table would not be tolerated.
"We will show Carpenter and his crew that if they do not deal with us fairly, they will deal with us at the ballot boxes within the next year," he said.
"Pay talks between the Department of Education and the teachers' union will continue this morning and both parties are due back in the commission later in the afternoon to report on progress.
"Deputy Opposition leader Kim Hames accused the Government of abysmal planning and management in coping with the strike fallout and demanded it apologise to parents and students for the disruption caused.
"Mr McGowan admitted that conflicting advice had left parents uncertain because the union confirmed only on Wednesday afternoon that it would be proceeding with the stop-work meeting. He said the only ones to blame for any inconvenience were the union's leaders.
"If I had issued a blanket order that no students go to school today and 94 per cent of schools are actually open that would have been ridiculous," Mr McGowan said.
"Ms Gisborne said the Premier's claims that the union's tactics were irresponsible and would worsen the teacher shortage and student withdrawals were "incorrect" and "a gross exaggeration".
"The very intention behind our log of claims and our attempts to draw to a close current negotiations with an offer of a decent salary and working conditions is very much about ensuring that were are able to improve and maintain a quality education system with qualified teachers for today and into the future," she said."
From The West Australian
- Only girl at school cuts a lonely figure (page 12)
by Joseph Cantanzaro"Reading, writing and arithmetic were off the syllabus yesterday morning as about 6000 teachers gathered at Langley Park in the city to back their push for better pay and conditions.
"Across town, outside Lake Gwelup Primary school in the northern suburbs, 53 year-old volunteer Ken Thorpe steadfastly manned the pedestrian crossing despite the fact the school had advised it would be closed for the morning.
"Only one of the school's 332 students showed up before 11 am. Head in her hands and a disgruntled look on her ace, the young girl cut a lonely figure in a silent playground.
"The West Australian agreed to a request from the principal not to publish an identifying photo of the student. The school would not say what activities she was given but said she was joined by about 130 others after 11 am when the teachers returned to work.
"At Lake Monger Primary, mother-of-four Jade Coles and her partner Karl Putney said they had no idea there was a strike until they heard it on the radio just as they were pulling up to drop off their children.
"Despite the shock, the couple responded to the situation with equanimity. While Ms Coles, intent on "finding some teachers", went through the ritual of herding her brood in the direction of the school gate, Mr Putney said he held no grudge against the dispensers of learning. "They've got 30 kids in their classroom every day. I think they should get a better wage," he said.
"Donna Moore and six-year-old son Jack seemed to be part of a small minority of parents and children that knew what was happening yesterday. Ms Moore said a phone call to the school had revealed only one teacher at Lake Monger had elected to attend Langley Park.
"I heard on the news this morning that I should keep the little fella home to support the teachers," she said. "I was willing to do that, but when I rang the school I was told only one teacher was away today."
"Lake Monger principal Jen Graffin confirmed only one teacher was absent and said the school was running normal classes. But she conceded confusion among parents meant that only 83 of 110 students turned up before 11 am.
"Ms Coles' daughter Amber, 10, summed up the mood of the students. Asked if she was disappointed at the prospect of no classes until after 11 am, she replied: "No way."
From The West Australian
- Letters to the Editor (page 22)
- Don't exploit the children
"I was appalled that the teachers' union called on parents to keep their children at home during the strike in support of their protest. Most people would think it is only in the most basic of Third World countries where kids are recruited to be part of the "army" of supposed depression.
"Let's face it, the strike was about the teachers' union in WA wanting its members to be the best paid in Australia (that's their claim) - nothing about being on the breadline or financial hardships, simply the best.
"Expecting parents, who are really battling with mortgages and other financial pressures to make ends meet, to stay home to safeguard the kids begs the question: what sort of society have we become?
"To those who thought up the idea of using innocent kids to be used in this sort of fashion, I suggest you have become the mjost frightening and disgusting example of exploitation of our children rather than what should be the precious development of our future leaders - our kids."
John Greenlees, Sorrento
- My solution
"The true worth to teachers of their union is yet to be tested in the current salary dispute. Commission registrar John Spurling has threatened it with a lettuce-leaf penalty if it is found to have defied the order not to strike.
"Union officials will not risk their sinecures and a lettuce-leaf penalty is a small price to pay for pretending to let teachers believe that their union can really make a difference. Teachers' interests would be served best by having the union deregistered and for each individual teacher to enter into a workplace agreement with their employer.
"Of course, an individual teacher would have to be recognised as a "professional independent teacher".
Gavin McGavin, Warnbro
- Variety scholarships for kids doing it tough
by Karen Hodge
"Teenager Paul Gilbert doesn't plan to let a rough start in life – including being born 29 weeks premature – stop him from becoming a top long distance runner."Even the 16-year-old Sevenoaks Senior College student’s parents didn’t think he would live long after being born far too soon.
"The Year 10 student, who could not even talk until grade one at school, proved everyone wrong.
"Despite suffering autism and severe anxiety he has a growing tally of medals in long distance running and hopes to represent Australia one day.
"Today he joined 18 other sick and disadvantaged kids who were handed a Variety Brian Treasure Memorial Scholarship worth up to $5000.
"The children’s charity presented the awards with the help of WA Governor Ken Michael at Perths Government House today.
"The recipients - aged eight to 17 – included budding ballroom dancers, ballerinas, artists and sporting stars.
"They suffered everything from Brittle Bone Syndrome to vision impairments and Down Syndrome.
"Others came from families with financial hardships.
"The charity handed out about $50,000 to this year's winners – giving them the chance to use the money to follow some dreams.
"Paul, who has been running for five years after a coach finally gave him a go, competes in half marathons, 1500m, 800m and 400m.
"He plans to use his money to attend the Pacific School Games in Canberra later this year.
"He is also attending the Special Olympics Junior National Games in Canberra in April thanks to scholarship money from Variety last year.
"Paul competed in the junior games in 2006 and came home with four gold medals.
"Paul told thewest.com.au that he took up running five years ago and his ultimate goal was to be an Olympic runner.
“I just love the feeling of running and going for my personal bests and bettering my time… I love the thought of all these achievements that you get when you do all this hard work,” Paul said.
"His proud mum Caroline Noble said her son was lucky to survive after being born so premature.
“He was very sick… I think he was about a month old before I could even hold him,” Mrs Noble said.
"Paul’s stepfather Peter said: “We seriously have to put the breaks on this guy.”
"Variety executive director Michael Pailthorpe said a lot of the scholarship recipients had special needs and he was amazed to speak to them about their dreams and achievements.More than 120 disadvantaged youth have been given the awards since the scheme started in 1996."
From The West Australian at link
Kwinana school blaze to be probed
Fire investigators will return to Gilmore College this morning to probe a blaze that caused $500,000 damage.
- ABC News
- IRC will prosecute teachers union
"The Industrial Relations Commission will prosecute the State School Teachers Union over yesterday's stop work meeting."The Union directed its members to walk off the job despite an order from the commission to abandon the half day strike.
"Thousands of teachers walked off the job to demand better pay and conditions.
"The matter will be referred to the full bench of the commission to consider possible penalties including a $2,000 fine or deregistration.
"The Union's President Anne Gisborne says she's disappointed.
"We informally have been advised that we'll be called before the full bench on the matter of the orders of yesterday and at this point in time I've got no comment to make," she said.
"The Education Minister Mark McGowan says the State School Teachers Union deserves to be prosecuted by the Industrial Relations Commission because it broke the law.
"Mr McGowan says he's not surprised by the Commission's move."
From ABC News at link
- Teachers union maintains members support industrial campaign
"The State School Teachers Union believes its members fully support its campaign for better pay and conditions even though less than half of the state's teachers attended stop-work meetings yesterday."The Education Department says 30 per cent of the state's public school teachers took part in the industrial action yesterday.
"Anne Gisborne from the Union disagrees and says it was more than 40 per cent.
"She says it was a successful action and there are good reasons why some teachers did not attend the meetings.
"There are two factors that may have well kept people away, one is the lateness with which we were able to deliver the decision, the executive decision to our members, and the other was people's confusion about the possible impact on themselves in respect to commission action," she said.
"The WA Industrial Relations Commission has confirmed it is investigating the union's involvement in the action.
"The union is due back in the Commission today."
From ABC News at link
- The Sunday Times Online / PerthNow
- Further strikes not ruled out [late update from 27 Feb]
by Paul Lampathakis
"Further strikes have not been ruled out by the WA State School Teachers' Union - after 7000 teachers returned to their classrooms following a half-day strike today.
"WA State School Teachers' Union president Anne Gisborne said this afternoon: "We'll always keep the option of industrial action available to our members as a mechanism of drawing to the attention of this Government and this department, our dissatisfaction with the progress of negotiations.""But Education Minister Mark McGowan said the State Government would not be intimidated by such threats and blamed the union for delays in closing a pay deal.
"We don't give into threats. The union has provided threats and intimidation. We don't give into that,'' he said.
"We're prepared to negotiate further with them. If they go and threaten that sort of thing (strike action), that doesn't impact on us."
"This morning, more than 5000 teachers stopped work to hold meetings in Perth and an estimated 2000 striked in regional areas, of a total of about 21,000 across the state, forcing the closure of 47 schools.
"Only about a third of WA's 240,000 public school students turned up to school today because of the half-day strike, with the union defying an order made by the WA Industrial Relations Commission on Monday not to strike."The teachers have rejected the WA government's previous offer of about 13 per cent pay rise over three years and are pushing for a 20 per cent pay rise.
"Ms Gisborne said the union would meet with the Education Department tomorrow morning and report back to the commission tomorrow afternoon.
"Mr McGowan said negotiations were happening all the time, but the union executive were a "completely divided bunch" that asked for different things regularly.
"We're prepared to keep on acting in good faith," Mr McGowan said.
"But they need to actually narrow the issues that they want to actually sort out as part of this agreement."
"He claimed the last offer would have made WA teachers the best paid in Australia.
"Under the offer, he said, level two senior teachers, after nine years of service, would have been paid $84,357 by February 2011, not including other allowances that might be applicable.
"We've acted in good faith and the (commission) recognised that in the order they provided earlier this week," Mr McGowan said.
"The school teachers union has thrown that order out the window, thrown the rule of law out the window ,and inconvenienced families and students around Western Australia."
"He said it was for commission to decide what action should be taken for the union's violation of its order not to strike.
"(But) I think going on history, there won't be any punishment for them, other than public opinion recognising that they've acted unlawfully," he said.
"I think teachers around Western Australia are outstanding people. I think they do a very good job, but the State School Teachers' Union executive has behaved in a shocking way."
"But Ms Gisborne said the union executive was not divided in its negotiations and many of the union's claims had been neglected issues for years.
"For example, additional planning and preparation time for primary teachers," she said.
"We've been seeking parity with our secondary colleagues for years,.
"And reducing class sizes. We've been successful in reducing class sizes in kindergarten to Year Three (lessons) and we believe it is now time to reduce class sizes in Years Four to 10, where class sizes are 32, as compared to 24.
"We've got a proposal to progress the reduction of class sizes over a number of (coming) agreements, so we don't believe this unreasonable."
"Ms Gisborne said workloads for principals needed to be addressed.
"There has been a recent national principals' survey that indicates that 97 per cent of secondary school principals are collapsing under the current workload," she said.
"We're seeking the beginnings of a real solution to address this problem for our members.
"So, clearly we have focused on many of the same issues for some time and have been negotiating on the basis of a log of claims from September 21, 2007.
"They've (the department) still got on the table, commitments that they haven't met even under the current agreement.
"Effectively, in some cases we are re-tabling what they have failed to deliver under the current agreement."
"Education Department Director-General Sharyn O'Neill would not be drawn on when another pay offer would be made to teachers.
"But she indicated that the department would be willing to meet the union more often to negotiate a quick resolution to the ongoing dispute."
From The Sunday Times Online / PerthNow at link
- The Australian
- National curriculum to rate performance
by Justine Ferrari, Education writer
"The national curriculum will include benchmarks for student achievement in each subject as well as what children should be taught."National Curriculum Board chairman Barry McGaw envisages a program that sets out different levels of student performance linked to the national assessment system.
"You have to have something in the curriculum about what performance at different levels looks like," Professor McGaw said yesterday.
"The first uniform national literacy and numeracy tests will be held in May for students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9, and will replace a minimum benchmark standard with different levels of proficiency.
"Professor McGaw was one of the architects of the OECD's Program for International Student Assessment that tests literacy, numeracy and scientific knowledge among 15-year-olds in 57 countries.
"He said Australia's national assessment regime had to be linked to the curriculum, and the standards might need to be reconfigured once the national curriculum had been produced.
"The 12-member board is charged by the Rudd Government with producing a national curriculum, from kindergarten through to the end of high school, for English, maths, history and the sciences.
"It will be implemented in 2011.
"The states and territories have already agreed to the development of nationally consistent curriculums, which Professor McGaw said was not the same as a national curriculum.
"There will be one national curriculum," he said. "In the past, the states and territories have agreed on the development of a curriculum framework to which they must sign up that they've aligned to their state curriculum.
"This will move that process on. I'm happy to use the plural and say national curricula if you mean one in maths, one in science, one in history and one in English."
"The board is also set to enter the literacy wars, with Professor McGaw saying he believed the English curriculum would set out a position on the best way to teach reading and that literature was part of an English course.
"Literature is an integral part of English; I think that's clear," he said.
"Professor McGaw said a division had arisen between English courses that separated literature for more advanced or tertiary-bound students, allowing less academic students to concentrate on language skills. As a result, some of the more complex skills of linking ideas out of a text had diminished, evidenced by the fall in reading scores among the nation's top students in the latest PISA results." [emphasis added]
From The Australian at link
- Teachers defy IRC as Carpenter faces more claims
by Paige Taylor
"The Carpenter Government's fight with striking taxi drivers and teachers this week could be the beginning of a tumultuous run as the powerful public sector union prepares to demand its workers get a bigger share of the state's predicted $2 billion surplus."More than 5000 teachers yesterday defied an order of the West Australian Industrial Relations Commission to rally on the Perth foreshore, closing 46 government schools for the morning.
"They rejected pay rises of between 13.7 per cent and 19 per cent over three years.
"West Australian teachers in their seventh year are the highest paid in Australia and the state Government offered to increase their wage from $69,132 to $78,577.
"Under the offer, a teacher with seven years' experience would earn $100,812 at a remote school while the most a teacher could earn without becoming a principal would be $112,282.
"But the wages are not extraordinary in the context of the state's phenomenal resources boom and chronic labour shortage, and teachers have resolved to strike again if necessary.
"Premier Alan Carpenter yesterday labelled the teachers' union grossly irresponsible, a day after he was lunged at during a rally of furious taxi drivers striking at Parliament House. They were protesting against the Government's plan to ease the city's taxi shortage by releasing hundreds more plates.
"The Government's next big dispute appears likely to be with the West Australian branch of the Community and Public Sector Union over a 14 per cent pay offer for 30,000 public servants.
"CPSU state secretary Toni Walkington said she believed the union's 12,000 members would not be happy with the offer, over three years, because they were stuck with sharp increases in living expenses, especially in the northern regions of Western Australia.
"Ms Walkington said it was not lost on her members that the state's police recently received pay rises of up to 25 per cent over three years and prison officers last July received pay rises of about 18 per cent over three years.
"CPSU delegates will meet next Tuesday to consider the offer, which Ms Walkington said had "glaring omissions". "I am anticipating it will not be considered adequate by our members," she said. "It's not a sufficient enough increase to stop people going to the private sector."
"In the resource-rich Pilbara, Ms Walkington said members working for the Government were forced to live in share houses where the rent was $2000 a week for "an ordinary four-bedroom place".
From The Australian at link
- The Age
- IT revolution sting may hit schools
by Jewel Topsfield, Canberra
"Education groups have warned of a gaping hole in the Federal Government's pledge to provide computers to all students in years 9 to 12, with the states and schools forced to pay for teacher training and infrastructure."They also say some schools do not have enough power points, suitable climate-controlled classrooms or IT-trained teachers to fully benefit from the so-called digital education revolution.
"Vin McPhee, from the Catholic Education Office Melbourne, said many schools were not prepared for the revolution.
"It is all very well to have a computer in front of every student but whether teachers are able to utilise them is another story," he said.
"Mr McPhee said some Victorian Catholic schools were eligible for a 50% increase in computers under the Government's $1 billion election promise to provide one for every senior secondary student.
"But the Catholic Education Office Melbourne had alerted government bureaucrats that these schools did not have enough access points, air-conditioned rooms or adequate power supply, he said.
"Opposition education spokesman Tony Smith said: "The Rudd Government is going to dump the computers at the door of the schools, smile for a photo opportunity and then leave the schools and the state government to pay for all the additional costs."
"A Senate committee was told last week the states would be responsible for IT training, client support, maintenance and integrating the computers with the school curriculum.
"Asked who would pay for private, independent and Catholic schools, Education Department secretary Lisa Paul told the committee: "We cannot be sure at this stage."
"When asked who would pay to replace lost, stolen or damaged computers, she said the election policy also did not go into that level of detail.
"It will differ state by state and system by system," she said.
"The executive director of Lutheran Education Australia, Adrienne Jericho, said the money for maintenance and infrastructure had to be found from somewhere. "Either fees go up, or we don't do something else," he said.
"If the Government spends $35,000 on a set of computers, how much extra do you have to spend to install them, maintain them, train teachers?"
"A spokeswoman for Education Minister Julia Gillard directed The Age to Labor's election policy, which says that in conjunction with the states, the Government would ensure teachers had access to training that enabled them to use broadband. The states would be responsible for the "implementation of sophisticated ICT strategies — including training".
"The president of the Victorian branch of the Australian Education Union, Mary Bluett, said schools were sick of government initiatives that grabbed big headlines but further drained school budgets.
"Governments get a lot of kudos out of taking these initiatives but then it falls on the school to find the money to ensure the initiative ends up being fully operative," she said.
"But Independent Schools Council of Australia executive director Bill Daniels said he did not have concerns. "We recognise the scope of the program and the benefits it will bring to our sector and are happy to work with the Government implementing it," Mr Daniels said."
From The Age at link
Saturday – Sunday, 1 – 2 March
- The West Australian
- Teachers union backs away from strike vow (page 14)
by Bethany Hiatt and Amanda Banks"Parents may have won a temporary reprieve from more teacher strikes after the WA Industrial Relations Commission decided to prosecute the teachers union for defying its order not to hold a stop-work meeting this week.
"The State School Teachers Union said on Thursday that it would not rule out further industrial action but president Anne Gisborne appeared yesterday to back away from that comment.
"At this stage, we are not planning to have any further industrial action," Ms. Gisborne said after talks at the commission.
"She denied it was a backdown or was related to yesterday's IRC talks. "(On Thursday) we explored what could be on the cards," she said. "At this stage we have no planned action in place."
"Commission registrar John Spurling said yesterday he would lodge an application for a hearing before the full bench of the IRC that could be held within days.
"Penalties could range from an undertaking not to strike again, a $2000 fine or an order to explain why the union should not be deregistered. The union is about to launch a TV advertising campaign as part of its push for higher pay and better working conditions and hit back yesterday at claims by Alan Carpenter that its actions were not supported by rank and file teachers.
"The Premier claimed the union executive was letting down the entire public education system by encouraging parent to turn to private schools.
"Mr. Carpenter continued his attack yesterday, describing the executive as dysfunctional and its action as completely irresponsible. "Their problem in part is attitudinal, there are some people in the leadership position of the SSTU who are stuck in the 1970's and they have got enormous internal friction in their leadership," he said.
"But Ms. Gisborne said the only thing still stuck in the 1970's was teacher's pay. She said the fact that 670 new members signed up between Monday and Thursday indicated that teachers were keen to take part in the strike.
"Shadow education minister Peter Collier said Mr. Carpenter was trying to dodge responsibility for the exodus of students to private schools, the main cause of which was the Government's failure to use the proceeds of the economic boom to build a decent education system.
"But Mr. Carpenter said Mr. Collier was being mischievous with statistics and the education budget had risen by 52 per cent, from $1.82 billion in 2000 to $2.77 billion this year.
"Figures released yesterday by the Australian Bureau of Statistics showed the number of children enrolling in private schools in WA had increased 35.2 per cent in the past decade, compared with 1.5 per cent increase in State school enrolments.
"Meanwhile, UnionsWA has called for a 5.9 per cent pay rise for minimum wage workers, saying there was no excuse for the State Government to raise its employees' pay by any less.
"UnionsWA called for the rise in a submission to an inquiry into WA's minimum wage."
From The West Australian
- Editorial
Teachers' strike a disservice to State education (page 20)"The State School Teachers Union did a serious disservice to the standing of teaching and public schools by striking in defiance of a WA Industrial Relations Commission ruling. It achieved nothing beyond disruption in schools and a public display of ragtag militancy more readily associated with some notorious unionists in the construction industry, who at least would have shown more competence in organising such a protest.
"It is not surprising that parents are increasingly attracted to private schools. The union is all to willing to turn public schools into industrial battlefields and thus to reinforce the perception that they offer services of questionable quality and reliability.
"Fair-minded people would accept that teachers deserve a decent pay rise, but this week's unnecessary disruption in schools - which penalised students and parents, not the Government - could only have eroded support for their cause. Indeed, the strike handed Alan Carpenter an opportunity to denounce the union executive for an "act of gross irresponsibility", and make the telling points that this encouraged parents take children away from State schools and discouraged people from becoming teachers.
"These were not the words of a Premier who is about to be swayed by militant unionism towards supporting a bigger pay offer to teachers. The strikers are naïve if they think the Government could allow itself to be seen to succumb to their rough-house industrial tactics. They also undermined teachers' claims to professionalism, not only by abandoning their obligations but also by continuing to support a union that resists implacably the introduction of a true system of performance-based pay which is a characteristic of professions.
"Opponents of such a system say it is hard to compare the effectiveness of teachers because of differences in work circumstances, though such problems are routinely overcome in private industry. The real problem is that the union has an ideological objection to testing that would reveal differences in competent teachers. While such attitudes and union militancy prevail, teachers will find it hard to gain public standing similar to that of other professions."
From The West Australian
- Letters to the Editor (page 22)
Note: Of a total of only six Letters published, these five addressed teachers' demands.
- You have stirred a sleeping giant
"As I looked around Langley Park on Thursday I saw etched on the faces of teachers many varied feelings. I saw concern at the reality of a sharp drop in pay next pay period; I saw a weariness that defies belief after a holiday that so many perceive to be the only reason we teach.
"I saw frustration and bewilderment that government could be so insensitive to the needs of education. I also saw the signs of an aging workforce.
"Thoughts crossed my mind that in 39C heat with no shade and no breeze - standing for an hour - the "heat" of the moment might literally be the downfall of many.
"You are the architect of this crisis, Mr Premier. Teaching is not an attractive career for young people. Despite your obvious reservations about the strengths of State schoolteachers, we have done something right.
"Most Year 12's are able to study and aspire to careers that offer so much more in many ways than teaching - pay, career advancement and job satisfaction.
"It is inconceivable that you take no responsibility for the decline in your ranks. You, when you were minister for education, believed the ill-conceived OBE was to be the direction of the future.
"Despite repeated concerns from experienced teachers you ignored all warning signs and are reaping the results of a decision made by a workforce that has weighed up the pros and cons and decided with its feet.
"You, Mr. Premier, have acted in an irresponsible manner and continue to do so. Your arrogance and disdain for a complete sector of the WA community should act as a clear sign to other groups about how you manage conflict and resolve issues.
"Your fear of the monster you have created is obvious. Teachers have been pushed to the wall. Thursday's action has simply stirred the sleeping giant and you can expect so much more if you continue to ignore the concerns of teachers."If there is nothing plausible to our argument, release the Twomey report and prove it."
Christine Kelly, Spearwood
We disagree
"Premier Alan Carpenter is trying to pull the wool over the eyes of the public with his claim that the union's stopwork action will drive students from the public education system.
"Under the leadership of recent and present education ministers McGowan, Ravlich and Carpenter, we have seen repeated failures by government to listen to the concerns of teachers for many years. About two-thirds of students are in State schools but they hold less than 50 per cent of the TEE population. Parents have started to vote with their feet as a mark of no confidence in how the Government is managing public education. Combined with a refusal to pay competitive salaries and address issues relating to work conditions, it is the Government that is damaging our system.
"Who could forget the debacle with OBE and the glowing example of "worst practice" change management with respect to the implementation of this fad? Oh, and what about the Twomey report? Release it now, Premier: What are you trying to hide?"
Evan Thompson, Northcliffe
"The audacity of the Minister for Education astounds me with his description of the teachers' strike as disgraceful, particularly when the Government coffers are overflowing with the thousands of dollars it is reaping from every new block of subdivided land being released.
"These additional funds are supposedly for new school development, so surely its previous budgetary allocation for new schools would now leave room for the additional wages for teachers.
Geoff Vickers, Greenwood
Babysitters?
"So, the teachers want another pay rise. Do they deserve it?
"Every parent knows that teachers are just glorified babysitters. And they get far too many holidays! So let's pay them as babysitters.
"Now let's see, babysitters get paid about $3 an hour, so for a six-hour day that would be 3 x 6 x 30 (average class size). Multiply that by the number of days these people actually work - in 2008 that would be 201 days.
"So, let's see now, that makes it $108,540. Hang on a minute, there must be something wrong with the calculator.
"Oh, by the way, it's not that long ago that teacher's pay was on a par with politicians."
A. Aston, San Remo
It's a joke
"So, the poor old "hard-done-by" teachers went on strike again. I'd like to thank them for providing me and many of my friends with a good laugh when they claim that the public is behind them.
"Their industrial thuggery has been so predictable over the past 20 years that I can almost set my watch by it. Every time the EBA comes up, the teachers go on strike again.
"If these people really want the public to get behind them, perhaps they may want to try living in the real world.
"I won't go on about their hours or their plentiful holidays. These old chestnuts have been flogged to death - and quite rightly so. But can someone please explain to me why, in a society where the Government is encouraging both partners to work, the Education Department allows schools to close, regularly, for "school development days"?
"This usually occurs on the first day after the school holidays have finished. With 13 weeks leave a year - three times that of most people - that it be too much to ask for professional development to happen during this leave, rather than punish parents by forcing them to remain at home or pay for child care?
"I work in the public health system. Unfortunately, we receive only four weeks a year and two days for professional development. I wonder how the teachers would feel if we closed public hospitals for "hospital development days"?
"To make a mockery of this situation, please note that Easter Tuesday is a student/teacher "holiday". Why? Don't they get enough?Michael Quadrio, Floreat
- ABC News
- Ad campaign won't help teacher pay dispute: Opposition
"The Western Australian Opposition says a Government advertising campaign over the teacher pay deal is likely to incite more anger in the state's teaching community."Education Minister Mark McGowan says the campaign will promote the true value of the Government's pay offer, which he says has been misrepresented by the State School Teachers' Union.
"Opposition spokesman on education Peter Collier says he does not expect the move will be helpful to negotiations.
"The strategy itself as I see it would be more divisive than conciliatory," he said.
"What we do need now is a cooling off period, because teachers quite frankly at the moment are extremely angry.
"They're lacking in morale but they're angry, and any action like this, as far as I'm concerned, will further incite that anger and create more hostility between the union and the Government."
"Last December members of the union rejected a $685 million offer, because it failed to address teacher's concerns over salary and work load.
"Mr McGowan says the union has misrepresented the pay offer as a 13 per cent increase, when it in fact ranges from 13.6 per cent to 22 per cent, depending on the teacher's level.
"He will launch an advertising campaign which he says will outline the facts of pay deal it is offering West Australian teachers.
"The State Government wants to pay teachers well, we have a good relationship with the workforce. It's the Teachers' Union executive that we have a difficulty with," he said.
"We're urging the Teachers' Union to negotiate in good faith with the Government and look at the offer that was on the table and talk to us in sensible terms about that."
"Mr McGowan says the Government is willing to deliver a significant pay increase if the Union is prepared to trim down its list of demands.
"He says some of the Union's demands for extra non-teaching time and smaller class sizes would only exacerbate the staff shortage.
"We're going to advertise what was on offer so that people understand exactly what was on offer to teachers," he said.
"We are also saying to the Union that we are prepared to continue to negotiate with them about these sorts of matters, but we don't want to have on the table things which are going to make the teachers shortage worse."
"But the State School Teachers' Union has dismissed suggestions that it has deliberately misrepresented the offer.
"Union president Anne Gisborne says Union members have been fully aware of all the details of the offer.
"Every single member had a package delivered to them last year to provide them with that information to make their judgement," she said.
"They read it and they recognised that it was an offer they weren't prepared to accept."
From ABC News at link
- The Sunday Times
- Cash call for teachers (page 12)
by Paul Lampathakis"Education Minister Mark McGowan has signalled that teachers may get more cash in pay negotiations, but other demands are unlikely to be met.
"We're prepared to negotiate as long as the WA State School Teachers Union in reasonable about their demands," Mr. McGowan said yesterday, after 7000 teachers held a half-day strike on Thursday.
"(Among) the things they say they absolutely have to have is smaller class sizes, but we already have the smallest class sizes in Australia."
"He said teachers also wanted more out-of-class time for factors such as planning.
"(But) all these things just add a requirement for extra teachers and obviously that's not something we can deliver," he said.
"Mr. McGowan reiterated his position of recent months that the offer teachers rejected in December would have made them the best paid in Australia.
"He said an "ordinary teacher", with nine years of service, who was prepared to do 40 hours of professional development over five years, would have been paid "a minimum of $84,357".
"Even if they're not prepared to have done that professional development, they'd be paid $78,500-plus, after seven years (service)," he said.
"Mr. McGowan said the Government was launching an advertising campaign, including an ad in The Sunday Times today, to make clear its position.
"He said the union misrepresented the offer as 13 per cent for everyone, when it ranged up to 22 per cent.
"But union president Anne Gisborne said the offer the union rejected in December ranged from 13.6 per cent to 15.8 per cent over three years.
"She said the new ads wrongly compared 2008 interstate salaries with a projected increase for WA teachers by 2011."
From The Sunday Times
Aboriginal pupil numbers rising (page 21)
by Paul Lampathikis"More WA Aborigines are now going to school, Australian Bureau of Statistics figures show.
"The Schools Australia report, which was released on Friday, said there was nearly 1.5 times the number of indigenous students at WA schools in 2007, compared with 10 years earlier.
"But the report also confirmed the continuing movement of students away from government schools to private schools.
"Student-staff teaching ratios also improved significantly across the state.
"The ABS report said the number of Aboriginal students at WA schools had increased to 22,353 in 2007 compared with 15,660 in 1997.
"It said also about 33 per cent of WA's 344,588 students went to private schools last year, up from 27 per cent of the 2007 total.
"In 1997, there were 18.1 students a teacher; by 2007 that had dropped to 15.4.
"Private primary schools also improved their ratio, from 17.9 students a teacher in 1997 to 11.7 in 2007.
"Government high schools also improved, dropping from 13 students a teacher in 1997 to 11.7 in 2007.
"Private high schools went from 12.8 students a teacher in 1997 to 12 in 2007.
"The number of existing government schools increased from 767 in 1997 to 769 in 2007. But the number of private schools rose from 264 in 1997 to 299 in 2007.
"Though there is a teacher shortage, the number of teaching staff rose from 22,424 in 1997 to 28,913 in 2007.
"A spokesman for Education Minister Mark McGowan said the minister hadn't seen the report and so could not comment.
"Opposition education spokesman Peter Collier said he was delighted to see an increase in the participation rate for Aboriginal students. But the report released this week by Coroner Alistair Hope into the drug and alcohol-related deaths of 22 Kimberley Aborigines showed that WA still had a long way to go in improving the education of Aborigines.
"Mr. Hope's report found there was no real state or commonwealth leadership in response to "appallingly bad" living conditions, including a lack of basic education, poor health, unemployment and lower life expectancy."
From The Sunday Times
- Teachers union may be prosecuted
by Paul Lampathakis
"The teachers' union moved one step closer to de-registration this afternoon - for igniting yesterday's 7000-strong half-day strike.
"The WA Industrial Relations Commission registrar is lodging an application for prosecution, following the WA State School Teachers' Union's decision to defy the commission's order on Monday not to strike."I am asserting that the union did not comply with the order of the commission issued on the 25th (of February)," commission registrar John Spurling said this afternoon.
"The application is to the full bench of the commission. And if the full bench accepts my argument, then they can do one of three things.
"They can accept an undertaking from the union not to do it again. They can fine them up to $2000, or they can require the union to come before the full bench to justify why they should not be de-registered."
"He expected that the matter would be listed within the next few weeks.
"The application followed an action where more than 5000 teachers stopped work to hold meetings in the Perth metropolitan area yesterday morning and an estimated 2000 went on strike in regional areas, of a total of about 21,000 across the state, forcing the closure of 47 schools.
"Only about a third of WA's 240,000 public school students turned up to school yesterday because of the half-day strike.
"The commission said on Monday that the strike was "not in the public interest".
"The commission also said on Monday, that as discussions between the parties to finalise the terms of a new agreement were still ongoing, the foreshadowed industrial action should not take place.
"The action was sparked following months of negotiations between the Education Department and the union, and the rejection by teachers, in December, of the WA Government's previous offer of a 13 per cent pay rise over three years. Teachers wanted a 20 per cent rise.
"Those who attended the strike have been docked pay for the half-day action, Government officials confirmed today.
"Mr Spurling also said there had been some progress in the stand-off between the Education Department and the union.
"A meeting in the commission today between the two parties resulted in an agreement that they would meet next Wednesday, again in the commission, he said.
"Union president Anne Gisborne said the union was disappointed with the commission's action, but was now preparing itself to face the commission's full bench.
"We regret that we felt we had to defy the order," Ms Gisborne said.
"But the union executive made a determination to go ahead with the action on the day. Their view was it was necessary to continue with the stop-work meeting."
"Ms Gisborne said the teachers' pay and conditions claim was about looking after the welfare of students, and providing qualified staff and good educational opportunities for students.
"She said unless teachers got "decent salaries" they would continue leaving the profession and the current shortage - which was reportedly fewer than 40 teachers this week - would bloom rather than be resolved.
"The risks of the teachers' shortage continuing included increases in class sizes and children not having teachers qualified in all the subjects they were teaching, she said.
"But Education Minister Mark McGowan has said that the last offer made to teachers by the Government - which was later withdrawn after it was rejected - would have made WA teachers among the best paid in Australia.
"He said under that offer, level two senior teachers, after nine years of service, would have been paid $84,357 by February 2011, not including other allowances that might be applicable." [He's finally admitted that only a few teachers would achieve this salary figure, and not until 2011. Web]
From The Sunday Times Online / PerthNow at link
Op Ed
Fools on the Hill, wake up
by Joe Spagnolo
"... Sadly, anyone who thinks that Parliament House is a place where all politicians act in a dignified and respectful way is very mistaken."To be blunt, some of our pollies are an embarrassment to themselves and the people they represent. I suspect that, for too long, the establishment at Parliament House has turned a blind eye to the goings-on of a few idiot parliamentarians.
"Don't believe me? Then do yourself a favour, go to Parliament House and sit in the Legislative Assembly and listen to MPs from both sides of the house.
"Sit there and listen to the abuse and rubbish that comes out of their mouths and then watch the faces of schoolchildren in the chamber as they look in disbelief at the people they have been told to look up to.
"In recent weeks there has been a fair bit of discussion about the shenanigans of Liberal leader Troy Buswell who got drunk one night at parliament. His bra-snapping incident sparked comment about a lack of respect for women at Parliament House and the need for equality.
"I agree, but the debate should be about respect and civility shown to all MPs, regardless of their gender.
"What Mr Buswell did that night at Parliament House was inexcusable. But is he alone when it comes to inappropriate conduct at Parliament House?
"How many sexist and stupid remarks have been made by MPs on both sides of the political divide?
"How many other things have happened at Parliament House that should not have?
"Go sit in the courtyard of Parliament House and sometimes you will see MPs guzzle down glass after glass of booze.
"It's an eye opener. Count the bottles as they come out of the bar; there are quite a few.
"How can you blame someone for getting drunk at a workplace when that workplace doesn't appear to discourage it.
"The Labor hierarchy is annoyed that more has not been made of the Buswell incident by the press and other MPs.
"Maybe the reason is that there is a strong suspicion that we're all growing a little immune to buffoonery at the House on the Hill.
"What is it they say about people in glass houses not throwing stones?
"I am not talking about male MPs unclipping female colleagues' bras at Parliament House. Hopefully, this was a one-off incident.
"I am talking about common decency and respect.
"I am talking about ensuring that pillocks like that Labor MP who approached me that day and called me a Ding at Parliament House gets the message loud and clear that such rudeness is unacceptable.
"The Buswell incident should be a wake-up call to all MPs. Their conduct should be of the highest order at all times.
"Before any more finger-pointing is done, let all MPs consider their own past conduct."
Full Op Ed in The Sunday Times Online / PerthNow at link
Editorial
Fruits of boom should be shared
Mr Ripper points to a multibillion-dollar capital works program, a declining share of GST revenue and generous wage settlements as reasons why West Australians should not expect "huge additional initiatives" in the pre-election Budget.He has accused West Australians of expecting too much...
But West Australians in all walks of life deserve to share in the fruits of of the state's booming economy. And if Mr Ripper wants to cry poor from the towers of St Georges Tce, he shouldn't expect them to fall on welcoming ears in the suburbs.
- The Weekend Australian
- Boom continues in WA as revenues soar [late update from 29 Feb]
by Amanda O'Brien
"Western Australian looks set for another record budget surplus this year, with figures showing first half state revenues up $890 million.
"While the Carpenter Government has forecast a surplus of $1.8 billion for the year, it has already achieved $1.37 billion in six months."Increased tax revenue from housing sales, payroll, and land and vehicle sales accounted for $580 million of the total increase.
"Royalty income also rose but by a comparatively modest $47 million, although this should strengthen in coming months as production and commodity prices continue to rise.
"The extra revenue underlines the ongoing strength of the WA economy, but it is also likely to exacerbate industrial problems in the west, where public sector workers are demanding big pay rises.
"While some claims have been settled, including nurses who recently gained an average 15 per cent over three years, other are on the warpath, including teachers who walked off the job on Thursday in support of a 19 per cent rise over three years. [??? Web]
"The Government's quarterly financial results show a massive boost in stamp duty revenue linked to higher property prices, up $209 million, combined with rocketing payroll tax receipts, up $176 million, from extra jobs created.
"Total Government revenue for the six months was more than $9.4 billion.
"But at the other end of the spectrum, spending was also up by $682 million or almost 10 per cent compared to the same period last financial year. Higher salaries and an expanding workforce was the primary contributor to the extra costs."
From The Weekend Australian at link
- The Sunday Age
- Students turn to sex work to help pay for university
Hundreds of university students in Victoria have turned to prostitution to pay their way through higher education, The Sunday Age has learnt.
Up to 40% of the female sex workers in Melbourne's brothels are attending the city's eight universities and other colleges.
- Letter to the Editor
- Lessons to learn
"The Sunday Age appears to have chosen class war on education (17/2). But some rarely heard points need to be made.
"One is that the amounts of money involved are trivial compared with a dozen areas of government waste and vote buying, including unneeded handouts to the elderly, of whom I am one.
"Another is to say that Paul Sheahan, quoted as supporting a system of aid to parents based on their need, is half right. To talk of the needs of schools rather than parents is just cant. But why pretend that there are just the rich who can send six children to Melbourne Grammar without assistance, and the strugglers?
"The marvellous visionary alternative of having nearly everyone in the state system, which is then forced by powerful parents to improve, simply won't happen in Australia. It would anyway favour the "rich" even more, because they would still have better schools in Brighton than in Broadmeadows."
James Guest, Jolimont
- The Age [Saturday]
- Exodus in state school attendance
by Bridie Smith
"The exodus from Australia's battling state schools has grown, with more parents sending their children to Catholic and independent schools."Official figures released yesterday showed 66.4% of the nation's 3.4 million full-time students were at government schools last year, falling from 66.8% a year earlier and 70% in 1997.
"In Victoria, which has the second highest proportion of students in non-government schools after the ACT, just over 35% of students, or 297,970, now go to non-government schools, compared to 262,948 a decade ago.
"While the proportion of Australian students attending government schools fell, the state school student population rose 1.7% to 2,268,377 in the decade. But their growth was dwarfed by the performance of non-government schools, where enrolments rose almost 22%.
"The figures are given in the Schools Australia report released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics.
"The snapshot of the education system also showed that while there was a jump in teacher numbers over the past decade, much of the growth was in non-government schools, where the number of full-time teachers grew by almost 38% from 1997, compared with 10.5% in government schools.
"In Victoria, the number of teachers in non-government schools grew 33.1% in the decade to 2007, while the government school teacher population increased by just 14%.
"The figures are potentially sensitive for the State Government, which is locked in wage negotiations with teachers, who say the state system is losing teachers to private schools where they can earn up to $20,000 a year more.
"Premier John Brumby said this week that education was his Government's "number one priority".
"The figures released yesterday reignited debate about the cause and effect of the drift to non-government schools as the Federal Government stood by the contentious funding model inherited from the former government. The funding formula, known as the SES model, measures a school's need according to the socioeconomic status of families who attend.
"Melbourne University education expert Richard Teese said the "postcode methodology" was biased.
"He said it was wrong to base school funding on the assumption that, for example, students at Geelong Grammar represented a random socioeconomic sample of the Geelong area.
"He also said funding should take into account the amount of money raised by schools through fees and donations.
"It's a very unfair system," he said. "There is a dominant partner and that dominant partner is eroding opportunity in public schools and in Catholic schools and it's got quite out of hand."
From The Age at link
- $20m for schools 'pitiful'
The [Victorian] State Opposition branded yesterday's announcement of a $20 million increase to school maintenance funds as a "Band-Aid" solution that would not come close to eradicating the $268 million school maintenance backlog.
- The Independent
- Failed! Political interference is damaging children's education, report claims [from 29 February]
The biggest inquiry into primary education for 40 years concluded yesterday that Labour's tight, centralised control of England's primary schools has had a devastating impact on children's education. Micromanagement, meddling and a succession of ministerial edicts have killed the spontaneity in the nation's classrooms. Teachers have been stripped of their powers of discretion. And the net result of a decade of new Labour "reform" has almost certainly been a decline in the quality of education that the young receive.
- The Sydney Morning Herald
- Op Ed
Sorry, wrong number: get with the times and try again
by Adele Horin
"We didn't need calculators to do the percentages. We had enough fingers to do the maths. There was Cate and there were nine men, 10 if Glyn Davis, the chairman of the Prime Minister's 2020 summit, was counted.
"For a moment Kevin Rudd's lofty ambitions for a national conversation on the nation's future descended into a debate about numbers - numbers and gender. There are to be 10 co-chairs at the April talkfest, and all the faces staring up from the morning newspaper were of high-profile men, except for Cate Blanchett.
"Numbers, numbers, numbers. We should be beyond counting. It's so boring. It's soooo 1970s. We should have no need to calculate gender imbalance in 2008. We should be able to put our minds to the high-minded topics the Government wants us to address - the future of the environment, social inclusion, the cities, the economy … instead of acting like a bunch of accountants.
"But unfortunately someone has to do the counting. And it is always the minority. Every time women stop adding up, someone subtracts them. Every time women plead feminist fatigue and put their calculators away, the rate of increase slows down.
"Funny how the gender once considered hopeless at maths is fated to do the sums. Every woman I know wants to dispense with the number crunching. For decades we have kept tabs on pay equity, the numbers of women on boards, in cabinet, in Parliament, in local government, in the trades …
"But if women don't keep a tally, no one will. I bet that photo spread of Rudd's hand-picked summit leaders seemed perfectly normal to the men who read the morning paper: David Morgan, ex-Westpac; Tim Fischer, ex-National Party; John Hartigan, News Ltd; Warwick Smith, ex-Macquarie Bank and ex-Liberal MP; Roger Beale, ex-public service chief ; Tim Costello, World Vision Australia; indigenous surgeon Kelvin Kong; and a couple of distinguished academics, Michael Good and Michael Wesley. They were the sort of blokes you would expect in such a line-up. Throw in the beautiful, smart and well-liked Cate, who is, nevertheless, untested in any field but acting, and all would seem right with the world.
"I bet it was only women who thought something was wrong. It is the outsiders who notice exclusion, not those in the inner circle. Men don't see gender imbalance unless it is pointed out. Most think harping about numbers is trite and a distraction from the important stuff. "We need the best brains, what does gender matter?" I could hear men, even progressive men, argue: "We're over that."
"But merit was not the sole criterion for making the PM's cut. Clearly someone was doing the numbers - only it was not gender that was a consideration. A good deal of calculation went into ensuring political conservatives were well represented to allay howls from the right. And probably someone mentioned the states to ensure not everyone came from NSW and Victoria. No one would be so foolish as to omit an Aborigine.
"But that is where the diversity ended, as if the old concerns of party politics and geography are the main game, and the 35-year struggle for women's representation an irrelevancy.
"In this post-feminist era, it is sometimes argued that women don't need special attention. Indeed, it is insulting to women to consider gender. Today it is only talent that is supposed to count. And women can rise on merit, they say. But even if the strict merit principle had applied in this case, Australia has many talented men and women, all capable of co-chairing a discussion. The business leader Heather Ridout, the medical specialist Fiona Stanley, the banker Gail Kelly, for a start, would all have performed capably.
"Unless those in charge make a conscious effort to add women, it will not happen. Unless women in the community keep vigilant, the count can go backwards. It is not so many weeks since people were applauding the Rudd Government for the inclusion of a record seven women in the ministry. But that should not be the end of the matter. Labor has an opportunity to raise the profile of women by counting them in wherever it has the power to do so.
"Women will not be better than men, nor even act differently. It is simply that women have a right to play a role in public life unfettered by conscious or unconscious discrimination. Young women, outsmarting boys at school and out-graduating them at university, need to know equal opportunity is real. If they decide to go for it, their gender should not count against them.
"The maths is not yet right. Business in particular is dragging the chain. In 2006 women comprised only 8.7 per cent of board directors in the top 200 companies. This is virtually unchanged since 2002 despite a now-sizable pool of women with board experience. As well, only six of the top 200 companies had a female chief executive.
"Another reason for vigilance is women's pay. Relative to men's it has gone slightly backwards in the past seven years. The current pay gap is 15.8 per cent (based on full-time adult ordinary time earnings).
"While this is the story, someone has to keep counting. Those in power can't be trusted to get the equation right."
From The Sydney Morning Herald at link
All Alston cartoons are © The West Australian Newspaper
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This page last updated 17 April, 2009 11:02 PM
