It's National Public Education Day today. This is an opportunity for us to wave the flag for public education and teachers and students all over Australia will be engaged in activities aimed at promoting the great work that happens in our public schools and TAFE institutions. You don't need me to tell you about that – you already know. What I do want to do is to talk to you about public education and its importance to societies such as ours.

One of the purposes of education, perhaps its most fundamental purpose, is to teach citizens how to participate in society in positive and meaningful ways. This generally includes providing the necessary skills and understandings which enable individuals to gain useful employment and contribute in an economic sense; but also the necessary social skills for participation in civil society.

The social and political contexts in which education occurs are critical. If, for example, a society is one in which women do not have the same legal rights as men, then that is what the education system will reflect; if the political system is fascist or communist then that too will be reflected in the education system.

In democracies such as Australia, public education has always been strongly linked to community building; curriculum has focused on the values of equality, inclusiveness and social justice.

In other words, education has served a public purpose at the same time as providing people with the skills to enable them to pursue their own life goals.

In fact, some commentators note that education not only makes democracy possible, it makes it essential. Once a country's citizens have an expectation that they will be included and consulted, they in turn expect their political representatives to include and consult. In this way education systems not only shape a culture, but they are themselves shaped by that culture.

Public schools operate today in a world which in many ways is hugely different from the way it was even thirty years ago. There is great economic opportunity – we are told that if we reskill; work hard; relocate; be flexible; if we do all of those things our country will be competitive with other countries; rich; an even better place to live than it is now.

At the same time there is increasing social instability. Some of this flexibility means that people do not have the same amount of time to spend with their families; the gap between rich and poor is widening; there is less trust – everywhere; we don't trust politicians, corporations; we don't trust professional integrity in the way that we used to.

You may have seen the survey which was published in the paper on Tuesday, where people were asked to rank 100 Australians in the order in which they trusted them.

Dr Fiona Wood was the most trusted followed by Olivia Newton-John and a series of celebrities. Our PM was rated in the bottom 15% of people to be trusted.

Schools, in the middle of this, are of course affected. We don't operate in isolation and we are actually being shaped by what is happening at the moment both here in Australia and globally.

In particular we are being caught up in the debate about what the role of government should be in a democratic and capitalist society – although I think it fair to say that much of the focus of the debate is on the “capitalist” part rather than the “democratic”.

For much of the past 60 years western democracies, with the exception of the USA, have accepted that governments have a significant role in providing essential services – water, power, public transport, health services and education – to ensure that everyone has access to these at no cost or minimal cost, no matter where they live.

The counter view is that the role of government is basically to create an environment in which private enterprise can flourish so that private enterprise can take care of those things and make a profit at the same time.

This is the view which currently prevails. As a result we have seen the breakup and sale of government utilities such as electricity and transport, often at prices below their value in order encourage private companies to take over the running of these services.

Handing these services to private companies whose goal is profit is causing fundamental changes to the way we think about how our society should work. We are changing from a society which believes that everyone has a right to the basic essentials for a decent quality of life, irrespective of their income or race or where they live, to one which says “ if you want it, you have to pay for it.”

(Here in Australia we've seen the privatization of detention centres managing people's lives for profit, which apart from destroying people's lives has demeaned our citizenship and our standing in the world.

We also have in one area of Mexico, where water is privatized, people paying 60% of the minimum daily wage for 100 gallons of water. The minimum daily wage is $5.00US; so it's costing $3.00 - for 100 gallons of water. Imagine the consequences of that for those actually on the minimum wage.)

In Australia, the privatisation of education has taken a form not seen elsewhere in the western world. Far from decreasing the amount of money being spent on education, the current Federal Government has actually increased the amount of money going to schools, but has ensured that most of that money is directed to private schools.

The Federal Government explains its funding model by saying that it provides choice to people who want to send their children to a private school but can't afford to. The logic for this is that, with the additional government funds, private schools can keep their fees lower, thus allowing poorer families the opportunity to attend.

Certainly, one of the consequences of this additional money being provided is that the number of small low fee paying schools has increased significantly. These are schools representing religious faiths, ethnic groups. What we also know is that most fee paying schools have actually increased their fees despite receiving additional funds.

Let's look at this ideal of choice. It is, on the surface, something no-one could criticise: everyone should have the freedom to choose what is best, or right, or appropriate for them individually.

But, as you know, choices always have consequences. And this particular choice produces winners and losers.

In the context of who loses, we need to think about what a society as a whole loses if we succumb to the “choice” argument in education.

Professor Alan Reid from SA points out that the problem with the argument as it is now presented is that choice is promoted as serving individual rather than community goals. This means that the public purpose of education is becoming of secondary importance to the private purpose.

(It's more important for my child to get a private school education than for me to support the public education system.)

Professor Reid asks the question:

Does this abandonment of the collective, or public, in favour of individual choice matter?” In my view it is one of the most fundamental issues facing this country because of its potential impact on Australian democracy.

He says this because....

Democracy needs nurturing and schools are one of the few places in our society for the sustenance of democratic discourse. This role cannot be limited to encouraging young people to learn about the institutions of democracy through the school curriculum. It also involves learning to practice democracy. Schools are places where young people from different backgrounds and experiences can learn democratic habits and capacities of liberal citizenship including the habit of civility and the capacity for public reasonableness.

In other words, it is much easier to understand people from different religious and ethnic backgrounds if we know them personally, if we are familiar with their beliefs and customs. Hatred and prejudice spring from ignorance. Segregating our children on the basis of religion, income or nationality does nothing to break down barriers; rather, it reinforces them.

I don't believe it's possible to maintain a healthy democracy without a healthy public education system which embeds those values of inclusivity, tolerance and equality, as Australian public schools have done and continue to do.

Putting individual needs ahead of those values only looks at half the problem; it does not consider the long term health of our democracy.

I want to finish on the question of trust – or lack of it. This is happening everywhere – the UK and the USA we know most about, but other western democracies are experiencing the same thing – people are more cynical and distrustful of our political system. In countries where voting is optional, most people do not bother to vote.

For Australians to rate our PM in the bottom 15% of people to be trusted, is not to be taken lightly; the Treasurer was ranked even lower and the immigration minister last.

It is real cause for concern, especially if it means that people of integrity and talent with strong community values don't seek election to public office.