Monday 20 May 2002

In a range of statements, in addresses to union gatherings, and now most recently in his Budget Speech In Reply Mr Crean has outlined a platform which conspicuously fails to stand up for the millions of Australian families who rely on public education to build a future.

This corresponds to Simon Crean's decision to champion the views of that bizarre theorist, Mr Mark Latham, whose own 'vision' would cause chaos and division. This new formulation, now called Modern Labor, seems indistinguishable from the Coalition in education.

Simon Crean's launch of 'Modern Labor' in his Budget Speech In Reply sent off alarm bells for supporters of public education across Australia. Mr Crean's speech had disturbing parallels with Mr Costello's Budget speech two nights earlier. The Opposition Leader outlined his 'alternative vision' and the need to "'secure our nation's future'. In the Crean vision however, the abandonment of reference to the public education system which provides the future for the 3.5 million Australians in our public schools and TAFE colleges was chilling and deliberate.

Mr Crean seems to have abandoned the commitments his predecessor and party made to the youngsters and families in public education. In so doing he is also jettisoning political wisdom. As Brian Toohey revealed in last week's Sun-Herald (May 12), 'The Liberal Party's internal polling showed that education was the one issue which could have lost it last year's election'.

The Opposition Leader made no mention of the funding of education even though it is the fourth largest line item in the Federal Budget ($12.324 billion). Like the Treasurer, Mr Crean spoke for thirty minutes and did not once even use the word 'public'. He also conspicuously failed to identify education as one of the areas in which the Coalition has 'Wrong Priorities'.

Mr Crean failed to condemn or seek to rectify the situation where 70% of Federal schools funding, amounting to ever-increasing billions, goes to the 30% of students in private schools, the most privileged sector of education in Australia. The neglect of TAFE also went unheralded. Teachers and parents will regard these silences as consent.

If this is what Modern Labor stands for in education then it is electorally doomed. Mr Crean appears to be hurtling towards the fate of those social democratic parties elsewhere which have sought to become pale shadows of their right-wing adversaries and have lost touch with the real needs of people."