It gives me a great deal of pleasure to join my colleagues today to stand here and speak in favour of the Education and Training Reform Amendment Bill 2020. Like the member for Broadmeadows and the member for Essendon talked about—and, dare I say, as the member for Essendon pointed out, Bruce Springsteen talked about—being born on the wrong side of the tracks: that was me. I was born on the wrong side of the tracks, and my gender was female, so technically, without a great education, I should not be here in this place. And that is why if there is one thing that our Labor team has in common it is that we love to be here in this place and we love to speak about education, and we love to speak about our Labor government’s commitment to delivering a first-class education to every child in this great state of Victoria.

We are building the Education State—and I do not just mean through bricks and mortar. But let us face it, it will be through bricks and mortar that we are building 100 new schools right across Victoria, including in my patch out in Tarneit. But most importantly, we are committed to building and expanding the minds of our kids, our students, whether it is in their first thousand days in their kinder classroom or in their primary or high school. We are delivering every child, regardless of their postcode, a world-class education, and in patches like mine in the outer west, that counts for something.

Let me tell you what else counts for something—our dedicated and passionate teaching staff. It never ceases to amaze me in this place that those opposite can never muster one positive story to tell about a young person, to tell about a student in their electorate at their local schools. I have to say, that says more about them than the students right across their electorates. This is a global pandemic. We have never stood here and said that it would not be without sacrifice. Things have not been perfect; they have not been perfect across the world. But we have done our best, and Victorians have risen to the occasion.

It was just last week that I was having another great conversation with principals right across my electorate—in fact principals from Baden Powell College, The Grange P–12 College and Tarneit Senior College—and we joined the CEO of Foodbank Victoria. We wanted to talk about the importance of food security in the outer west and for kids in Wyndham, and it was absolutely remarkable to me to again be blown away by the absolute determination and leadership that our teaching staff here in Victoria continue to show. In fact I am not sure if you are aware that many principals right across my local schools have been putting together food hampers in collaboration with Foodbank Victoria as part of this pandemic. This is not only to deliver to those students who were learning from home as part of their remote learning but to deliver these to students that they knew were vulnerable, whose families were doing it tough and whose families could not always be putting wholesome food on the table. Now, teachers would create these hampers and drive them to the houses of their most vulnerable students, and this was a perfect way for them to be able to do a check-in of kids most at risk. This was just another example of how truly remarkable our teaching staff have been during this pandemic.

The first key change that this bill does implement is in relation to the Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority and their role and powers in hiring teachers as fixed, casual or sessional employees to assist them in administering the VCE program across all Victorian secondary schools, and it is great to be able to talk about the VCE, because I also want to acknowledge the hard work that our VCE and VCAL students have put in right across the state and particularly our year 12 students. There is nothing more challenging than finishing your final year at school during COVID, and hopefully this will be the only cohort of year 12 students that will ever have to face this challenge. It is one that nobody could imagine, and there is no doubt that all of us here would wish that it was otherwise.

Over the last couple of months I have been holding a series of COVID round tables with some of the year 12 students in my electorate. Like the rest of us they have been anxious during this pandemic, and there is no shortage of questions—questions like ‘When will we be going back to school?’, ‘What are our exams going to look like?’, ‘How will this affect my ATAR?’, ‘What’s uni going to be like next year?’, ‘Will I have a job to go to?’. These are just some of the discussions we have had, and talking them over it feels quite cathartic to see the relief and the calm that these honest and frank conversations have instilled in these students. It is a very stark contrast to the COVID madness that has been whipped up by those opposite. I would say that the likes of my senior students from Tarneit have a much more focused, calm, mature and considered approach to the very serious issues and challenges facing our state, and it has most certainly been a privilege to spend an hour with them each month talking about these serious issues.

Having watched the case numbers over the last week, it is clear now more than ever that our government’s strategy has worked. When I think about students that have approached their studies with maturity and a positive determination to overcome the challenges presented by coronavirus, I think about the students and I think about the teachers from Al-Taqwa College in Truganina. When the second wave broke out this school found themselves at the forefront of the pandemic, with daily media coverage focusing on the Al-Taqwa outbreak and everyone pointing their fingers at this local school. My local community was subject to an assault by our conservative media, with the usual dog whistling that followed—that this was a virus being spread by the Muslim community and they were somehow to blame. And the college felt that it became a scapegoat. It became a scapegoat, and multiculturalism was blamed for the spread of this virus.

But what you do not hear about—and it is not talked about often enough in this place—is the backlash that the school received. When the first cases started rolling in at Al-Taqwa, I started meeting and talking on a daily basis with principal Omar Hallak, the vice-principal and the leadership team at the school, and if we were not speaking on a daily basis, sometimes multiple times a day, it would be multiple times a week. They were truly mortified about the impact of this rhetoric on their community. This is a school with over 3000 students from across Melbourne, and I cannot tell you how despondent they were in telling me about the messages of hate the school received and how damaging it was for staff and students.

But having recently spoken to many of the year 12 students at Al-Taqwa College I am very pleased to say that I have full confidence that these students will get through their exams. They will not only get through their exams, they will go on to university and trades and employment. They will be able to follow their hopes and dreams. They will get through it. Their families are right behind them, and do you know who else is right behind them? Their teachers, which again is about the leadership, compassion and passion for the kids in our local area that my local teachers continue to show.

Now, another area where this bill aims to make changes is around our early childhood educators. These changes build upon changes we made last year in the Children’s Services Amendment Act 2019, aligning our early childhood education quality standards with our national framework. Because of this the regulations governing our early learning and development centres are now in line, as they should be, with the rest of Australia. One change that the bill hopes to keep is a narrow definition of the term ‘educator’. As it stands, the national law defines ‘educator’ quite broadly, including those who do not have an early childhood qualification. There is a very big difference between a kindergarten teacher and a person who runs a day care centre, which is why this bill will narrow that definition of ‘educator’ to only include those who have a qualification in early childhood education.

Indeed early childhood education is a growing field, and I am very proud to say in this place that in Tarneit we have the highest number of childcare workers in the state, and this sector will only grow in importance as we roll out three-year-old kinder. I for one am very much looking forward to that next year as it is rolled out in Wyndham, and with this rollout comes a huge demand for our early childhood educators, which is why we have spent $28.5 million on making early childhood education and care certificates and diplomas tuition free as part of our free TAFE program. Early childhood educators have also done an incredible job during this pandemic, and I pass on to them a heartfelt thankyou for taking care of some of our smallest and most vulnerable students out there. It has been remarkable to see the ways in which these educators have continued to engage with students. It is for these reasons I commend the bill to the house.