Dear Shadow Minister.

If funds provided for private schools are devoted to public schools it will improve the public schools.

Parents who want to send their children to private schools can still do it and pay what it costs. Taxpayers should not have to support it.

Some children will leave the private school system and go into the public schools. The public schools will be improved and better able to care for them.

The economy will be improved by that.

I am glad I am 89 years old and have no children of school age. I would not want to send them to a private religious school nor to a public school with fundamentalist chaplains. All my grandchildren are not living in Australia. Although I miss them and do not see them often I am happy that they do not go to Australian schools.

However, the rotten system that you support will probably continue in the foreseeable future. It is cheaper to continue it than to provide quality education for all. The less well off will continue to subsidise the schools of the better off. Unfairness triumphs if it’s cheaper, and those who have the money make the rules.

The corrupt and unfair system will probably continue for a while.

David nothing will improve public schools while they are run by the unions. They are on a very steep descent to the lowest level possible.

Until the dropkicks are weeded out & sacked there will be only further decay.

On pay, we should reduce the pay to what the job is worth. Things like Media Studies, Dance, & Music appreciation teachers should have to pay to be allowed to indulge in their hobby. Most of the rest should be paid at child care rates. That is about all most are doing.

Yes, pay senior Math, Physics, Chemistry & English teachers, but only those who get results, should be paid double the going rate. We waste far too much money on gobbledygook time filling rubbish, & not enough on the 3 Rs.

David,

if you take the funding from independent schools, you will most probably create a disaster in the public schooling system. For example in NSW about 40% of high school pupils go to independent schools. Of these schools, only about 15% are elite schools which anyway get funding of about 25% of public schools per student.

The vast majority of schools charge far less and get up to 80% of the funding that public school students do, which makes up more than 50% of their entire budget. If the funding were removed, these schools would close increasing public school attendance by 50% overnight. While the funds confiscated from the independent schools would not even cover the additional teachers etc for the new pupils, the real disaster would be in the $100 bn or so required to build new teaching facilities.

So in order to meet your socialist ideal of bringing everyone down to the same level, you would completely stuff up not only the independent schools but the public ones too.

Dear Shadow Minister,

It is not socialist to fund only public schools. The US is more of a capitalist country than Australia. The US funds only pubic schools. When you run out of arguments then you start calling names. That is what you are doing when you call not funding private schools socialist. In a capitalist country private businesses start up with private investors. Either they provide goods and services to the extent that they make a profit or not. If they don't make a profit they go under. A private school is a private business. They have no more call to be funded by the government than any other private business. Funding private business of any kind erases the distinction between public and private and is a step toward socialism. Capitalist states should not fund private businesses of any kind including schools. Apparently you not only are ignorant of the difference between correlation and causation you are also ignorant of the difference between capitalism and socialism.

Dear Hasbeen,

My mother was a teacher during the 1920s. There were many restrictions on teachers' lives. A female teacher had to quit if she got married. That is why my mother quit teaching. The unions have made it possible for teachers to live normal lives and get decent pay.

We differ. I think schools should not only prepare students to make a living. They should also educate children in activities that make life worthwhile. An appreciation of and an ability to perform in either arts or sports is something that makes life worthwhile. I think media Studies, dance, & music appreciation belong in the school curriculum.

David,

Who are you kidding, the very definition of socialism is the push towards state ownership of production and service supply. The Government's duty is to provide services, especially those known as public goods such as health and education. That the government co opts the private sector to deliver these goods is common practise and the list of services provided using private companies would be too long for this blog.

The move away from state centralised ownership and control of schools is happening in many countries incl the UK and Finland, where local control of the running of the schools and the hiring and firing of teachers has led to improved results with identical funding. Notably, the USA is pushing towards fully funding Charter schools which are independently run but government funded and similar to our lower cost independent schools.

As for the funding of schools generally, the government should have the following objectives:
1 Ensure that every child has access to a decent education,
2 That the country achieves the best overall academic results from its schools,
3 That 1&2 above are achieved with the minimum cost to the taxpayer.

All three objectives are enhanced by subsidizing independent schools.

Dear Shadow Minister,

S. 116 of the Australian Constitution states: The Commonwealth shall not make any law for establishing any religion, or for imposing any religious observance, or for prohibiting the free exercise of any religion, and no religious test shall be required as a qualification for any office or public trust under the Commonwealth.

Non-government schools are primarily religious, and, in my opinion, the government is violating S. 116 in supporting those schools. The US has almost the same wording in its Constitution as S. 116, and the interpretation of its court is that religious schools should not be funded by tax money. Charter schools in the United States are indeed similar to private subsidised schools in Australia, and I see the funding of those schools as an attempt to get around the ban on funding religious schools. The US Supreme Court has judged that in the case of Brown vs. Kansas of education that schools which segregate students by race are illegal. I hope that it will also judge that segregating students by religion which both the charter schools and the so-called independent schools of Australia do is equally illegal.

Let us take the example of Finland which you cited. Finland has an excellent record in student achievement. Parents may either opt for a secular public school or a religious school. Both are funded by the government. Both cost the same thing to the parents which is nothing directly since both are funded by taxes. The facilities of both are equal, and the pay of the teachers in both are the same. The record in both of students going on to higher education is also the same. That is most unlike the situation in Australia where in general the students in the so-called independent schools go to schools that are better funded and better equipped. In Finland the religious schools are funded to the same amount as the non-religious schools.

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