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Catholic schools big losers in state cuts
Happy faces but an uncertain future
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Printable version |
| By Sharyn McCowen
16 September, 2012 |
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| ALL SMILES NOW: Students of St Joseph’s primary school, Rockdale, won’t be smiling when the state budget cuts hit their school from July 2013. |
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Catholic schools will lose out in state budget cuts for education that will total $1.7 billion over the next four years.
Despite being lower than expected, the figures are still unacceptable, say outraged Catholic education leaders.
Catholic students, parents and staff signed a petition, rallied outside NSW Parliament and called on their state MPs to overturn a plan to slash $100 million in funding for Catholic schools over the next four years.
The O’Farrell government told education leaders last week that it would cut funding to Catholic systemic schools across the state by $24.5 million a year from January 2013.
Funding to private schools will now be capped, saving the government $116 million over four years.
State Minister for Education Adrian Piccoli said the budget cuts, which also affect state schools and TAFE, will come into effect from July 2013.
Opposition leader John Robertson said Labor would vigorously fight the school funding cuts.
“Labor opposes these cuts and will work with the crossbench in the Upper House to block legislation that seeks to cut funding for any school in NSW,” he said.
The Shadow Minister for Education and Training, Carmel Tebbutt, said: “The education of NSW students shouldn’t be put at risk because of the O'Farrell government's budget cuts.
“At a time when we should be investing more in our education system to ensure our students are able to compete with the best in the world, it defies belief the Premier would seek to slash school funding.”
The cuts are a “breach of trust”, according to the executive director of Catholic schools for the Archdiocese of Sydney, Dr Dan White.
Mr Piccoli stated publicly last month that “schools with higher needs should always receive additional funds regardless of their sector” and that public and low fee non-government schools ought to benefit from decisions made based on the Gonski review.
“Clearly these cuts were in the wind even as he spoke,” Dr White said. “This is a breach of trust.
“Catholic schools already receive only a quarter of the funding that the State Government provides to public schools.”
NSW government per capita grants provide 20 per cent of the annual recurrent income for most systemic Catholic schools in the state, which is used for teacher salaries and operational costs.
“This decision looks like a cynical attempt to reduce the State Government's financial commitment to the funding of schools in the lead-up to negotiations with the Federal Government on a new school funding model,” Dr White said.
About 240,000 students in NSW – more than one in five – attend Catholic schools.
“This unprecedented withdrawal of state aid to Catholic schools, made without consultation, will be devastating for thousands of families,” he said.
Dr White said funding cuts will affect special education and refugee programs, and will result in larger class sizes.
“I cannot emphasise strongly enough what a cruel blow this is to the thousands of everyday Catholic parents who have chosen to send their child to a Catholic school.
“Our Catholic schools already operate on only 90 per cent of what government schools receive, and for years now annual increases have never exceeded cost of living increases. Catholic schools save the government many millions of dollars every year.”
The decision comes 50 years after the Goulburn School Strike, when the town’s Catholic schools closed their doors in protest against a lack of state aid.
In doing so, the Catholic school system successfully demonstrated the degree to which it shoulders the cost of education.
More than 1000 Catholic school students then asked to be enrolled at local public schools, which – ill-equipped to accommodate the influx – turned away more than half.
“It is more than a little sad that this year, being the 50th anniversary of the Goulburn Strike, when Catholic school parents took a stand in the fight for state-aid for Catholic schools, that the NSW Government would now seek to roll-back that hard won state-aid,” said the chairperson of the Council of Catholic School Parents NSW, Catherine Ible.
The chairman of the Catholic Education Commission and Bishop of Parramatta, Bishop Anthony Fisher, said the “devastating” proposed reduction in state aid for schools could result in job losses.
“Catholic schools may be forced to raise their fees by between $100 and $500 per student per year, on top of any necessary increases for inflation,” he said in a statement.
“This may force some families out of Catholic schools, force reductions of teachers and curriculum options, or even force some school closures.
“The recent Gonski report on funding for all Australian students relied upon Commonwealth and State governments negotiating future funding in good faith.
“Unfortunately, this NSW government decision erodes its credibility in such negotiations. It also repudiates the public positions of both the Commonwealth Government and the Federal Opposition that no school – government or non-government – will be worse off financially from 2014.”
Bishop Fisher called on Catholic students, parents and staff to contact their state MPs to protest against the cuts.
The Catholic Education Office also urged those affected to contact Education Minister Piccoli and Premier O’Farrell, and to sign a petition on the CEO website.
But Mr O’Farrell said he was not interested in campaigns, and diminished the Catholic education system as “sectional interests”.
“We'll make decisions based on the broad public interest, not sectional interests,” he said. “If our revenues are down $2 billion a year, we will not continue to spend at current levels because that's a recipe for disaster.”
Dr White said “stripping funds from Catholic schools cannot be justified” and said Catholic schools will call for the decision to be abandoned.
“The Catholic community will be making the case to the O'Farrell Government in the strongest possible terms to abandon this poorly advised decision so that the process of restoring trust with the families of children in Catholic schools can commence.”
The decision comes at a time of “unprecedented pressure to provide extra Catholic schools in the growing urban development, the north-west sector,” said executive director of schools in the diocese of Parramatta, Greg Whitby.
• Statements by bishops, CEO – page 14
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