The NSW government is still the only state government that has signed on to the federal government's Gonski agreement on funding education. Carol Duncan spoke with NSW Premier, Barry O'Farrell, about his decision to sign and the comments by opposition education spokesman, Christopher Pyne, who has said that Barry O'Farrell has signed a 'bad deal'."
"We believe that Gonski offers a good deal for NSW, but importantly it will help us deliver the improvements that we want to all schools across NSW to give students a better education. The better our students go, the better for our state."
"I said when I stood beside the Prime Minister when the agreement was signed that should government change in September that the new government may have a different view. Obviously they'll have to sit down with states and territories and talk about that, but I'm absolutely convinced that whoever is in office will understand that the current federal funding arrangements are unfair."
"The best example of that is if you are family which has a child with a disability, under certain circumstances on the basis of the disability that child attending a public primary school, for instance, can have a fulltime carer with them. Should their parents decide to send them, for instance, in high school to a non-government high school that carer doesn't go with them because of the existing funding mechanisms."
"I think that is unfair. My view is that a system which provides everyone with a basic level of support and then directs more resources to people in need, whether that need relates to disability, socio-economic, aboriginality, or something else, is a fairer system and will help us inject more dollars more fairly in the system, will help us deliver better outcomes and help produce that strong Australia we want."
Christopher Pyne has written to state premiers calling the federal government's campaign a 'con job'. His letter to Mr O'Farrell claims that the decision to sign the Gonski agreement means that NSW schools stood to lose $454.9 million over three years.
"We said on the day that the agreement was announced that like any program there is a gearing up period, so over six years, you don't spend all the money in the first year because you've got to get the systems - independent, Catholic and public - as well as the schools - ready to receive. So the program gears up. I notice his time frame. I'm absolutely confident that over the time frame agreed we will see an additional $5 billion extra put into schools across NSW."
The stalled redevelopment and extension of Newcastle Art Gallery continues to be a point of discussion. With fully-costed plans in place what can be done to persuade the NSW government to support the project, particularly given the NSW Art Gallery has plans for a $400 million redevelopment?
"Well I just don't have the $7 million and I made that clear a month ago when I was in Newcastle. If I had the money I'd happily consider it."
"We fund arts across the whole of NSW. Some of that funding for the Art Gallery of NSW enables the Archibald collection to travel to regional galleries including the Hunter gallery from time to time."
"The Art Gallery of NSW, the art gallery in Albury, have all put in requests for additional funding to build additions to their galleries and they're getting exactly the same answer that regrettably I have to give to the people of Newcastle. If you don't have the money you can't spend it."
"We had to make savings within our budget in order to find the extra dollars to sign up to the Gonski agreement, so rather than budgets expanding they're contracting because we're prioritising things like education and disability."
"We're not saying never, but what we're saying is, that in this next budget we don't have the dollars to set aside. But there will be in the next budget some announcements around other issues across the Hunter that will also hopefully address the basic services that people want to see improved."
The 2011 NSW election saw the Liberal party hold the Hunter for the first time in history. Yet that 2011 primary vote saw a result of ALP 32.9% and the Liberals with 33.1%. Does Mr O'Farrell feel that his government's hold on the region is tenuous and does he feel a sense of dissatisfaction amongst Newcastle and Hunter voters who changed their vote for the first time?
"I get the sense when I go up there that people understand that we are seeking to improve services across the board. So whether it's the 4,000 state-wide additional nurses, teachers and police of whom many are in the Hunter region, whether it's the improvements to school maintenance, whether it's the additional dollars going into person-centred care for people with disabilities, their families and carers, I think people understand the mess we inherited, people understand we're getting on with the job of making progress. "
"Is it happening as fast as people want it to happen, including the Premier? No. But most messes you inherit can't be finished overnight."
"Expectations are always going to be high but the good news is that my next shareholders meeting is in March of 2015 and what we'll be asking is for people to assess the full four years, to assess what we started with, what we've delivered and what we are continuing to deliver and make a decision then, but we took a decision at our first cabinet meeting that we wouldn't be influenced by opinion polls because if we did that, if we decided to govern with an eye to politics, we'd be no different to our predecessors who never had a consistent approach, who never set themselves a goal and worked steadily towards getting it."
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