I rise to speak on the Education and Training Reform Amendment Bill 2024 this afternoon, and it is actually great timing for me to be able to stand in this place and again speak on education and training reform. Before I begin my contribution, I want to put onto the record something pretty amazing and a little bit sad that happened last week. One of my fabulous and much-loved staff members Maryam Saberi, who has been with me for two years helping out in my office – my little 2IC and the most positive young woman I think I have ever come across – left on Friday. I am very happy to say, but very sad to say, she left me to go on and be a teacher. Folks, when she arrived in this country from a very distant land, Iran, she did not speak English. She went to Western English Language School in Braybrook and learned how to speak a bit of English before she went on to finish her high schooling at Hoppers Crossing Secondary College. When I asked Maryam why she wanted to be a teacher she gave me a response I have not heard for a very, very long time, and this really goes to the heart of why teaching and being an educator is so important in this state. Maryam looked at me and smiled and said, ‘I just love children. I love them.’ She scored a great role at a school in Wyndham Vale. I was pretty upset that it was not in one of the many brand new schools that we have built in Truganina. Out in Wyndham Vale she started on Monday, and I am sure she will be doing an absolutely tremendous job there. But it was very sad to lose her – and to lose her on Friday last week, which was a celebration of teachers right across the world in fact. It was a really moving moment there with my Maryam as she went off to be a teacher.
But I do have to say it has been a really good week here. We have had legislation introduced, and we have the opportunity to speak on some of my favourite policy areas – education included, and the other one, yes, is transport. It is always clear that this Labor government values and contributes enormously to Victoria being the Education State. For so many Victorians, the vast majority of whom cannot yet vote and have their say in the democratic process, education is the most important investment we can make in their lives, because it is about affecting their futures. I see it whenever I am out and about in my electorate visiting local schools in my community. When we visit our brand new schools in the outer west, schools that we have built and opened, I see time and time again how these investments are making an absolutely profound difference in the lives of local kids in my community. Because as much as we can talk about the awesome work that teachers do, and indeed we can, as well as the work we have done in strengthening our education curriculum, I know like most parents I was pleased to see some of the announcements we recently made about phonetics and improving literacy outcomes.
This is all pointless if we do not have the four walls and a roof that make up a classroom for kids to learn in. I say time and time again: our kids deserve a first-class education in a world-class facility, and indeed that is what we are building in the outer west. It is not just in the outer west that we are building brand new schools, we are upgrading at a tremendous rate existing and established schools in the middle and inner suburbs of Melbourne’s west. Seeing the transformation of these classrooms, which could be dark and dingy and smell of mould and must, actually reminded me of what my school looked and smelled like.
When we do these upgrades it is incredible to see the transformation, and the kids cannot believe it. In fact one of the upgrades that we did that caused the most amount of excitement – and I have to say it gave me the most amount of joy to go ahead and cut a ribbon earlier in the year – was at Ardeer South Primary School when we upgraded their toilet block. The kids could not believe how fantastic it was to have new dunnies at their school, and they could not wait to use them. I have to say they looked amazing. They looked absolutely amazing. They were light, they were welcoming, kids felt safe, and they were more than happy to use them. These are the kinds of investments that matter, as well as the investments into our educators.
What I do want to put on record is that – I was pretty impressed when I read these stats – in the past 10 years our Labor government has gone ahead and built 50 per cent of all new schools in Australia, full stop. Ten per cent, people – 10 per cent – of all new schools nationwide have been built in Wyndham, and I think that is pretty incredible. I know that when I am at these schools and I look at the state-of-the-art learning facilities, I could only dream of that when I was a child, and I am reminded each and every single day of how important that is.
Just a few months ago I was fortunate enough to have the Premier pop over to Sunshine. Sunshine Primary School, as the member for Footscray will know, is one of the oldest, if not the oldest, schools in my electorate, and you would not know it. You would not know that that is a truly old school, because we have just finished an $11 million upgrade, which has completely transformed that school. We are transforming the patch of land just next door, because we are building Sunshine primary kinder – brand new kinder – so folks can get rid of that double drop-off. I have to say that transformation of that school, even keeping it in line with its heritage, is just truly amazing, and the principal, teachers, kids, school community and parents could not believe what an $11 million investment upgrade to that school could do.
I am not just talking about building new schools. We know that we are rolling out three- and four-year-old kinder so our kids get the best start to their school life and live out, most importantly, their best life. That early childhood education is just so important. We have not just made kinder free so that no child misses out on going to kinder and to save parents thousands of dollars each year. We are also going ahead and assisting folks with the cost of living by introducing the $400 school savings bonus, which came out in the budget earlier this year, and that was really to help families with school-aged kids cover those common costs associated with education, be it uniforms, textbooks, camps, excursions and so much more. It is also helping out families by us continuing to roll out the school breakfast club, and we are now doing that to all government schools so that no child goes hungry. And as someone who loves being on toaster duties at my local schools, I cannot tell you how popular school breakfast club is. It is not just about the kids that have not been able to have a feed before school but about kids wanting a second or third breakfast just because they love toast. I would like to say toast and Vegemite, but it turns out that toast with butter or toast and honey is really popular as well.
But of course it is not just about the students. We have done a lot to support our hardworking teachers as well, including the Victorian Academy of Teaching and Leadership, which includes the teaching excellence program. We have helped new teaching students cover the cost of their degree through scholarships so that more students get to see teaching as a viable profession. It is an incredibly important profession, and dare I say it is an essential service. On top of that, we are also supporting more teaching students, just like my Maryam, and teachers taking up teaching posts in regional Victoria so that our regional schools have the staff that they need to give their kids a great education as well.
There is just so much happening in this space, and looking at the time I have got left in under 90 seconds I will not go into everything that sits under that list. I said earlier in my contribution – and I will say it again – Labor has built the Education State. And when it comes to our schools, I say to parents time and time again, regardless of where they live, regardless of their postcode or neighbourhood: we have got your back.
Our record on schools and education, quite frankly, speaks for itself. Those stats around the new schools being built in Wyndham are truly, truly extraordinary.
Whilst this bill introduces a number of pretty small changes, particularly around tackling noncompliant schools which are not registered, this bill is yet another step forward, an important step forward, towards creating a stronger and fairer education system. I cannot support that enough. I do want to commend the minister for the incredible work that he has been undertaking since taking up the role here in this place. I know that time and time again he has come out to my electorate, and principals, parents and students have welcomed him with open arms. I am looking forward to having him back out. I commend the bill to the house.
