Residents of Moggill and surrounds have been asking for a high school in the area since at least 2014. It was a campaign issue in that state election, and it has remained an issue for the community ever since.
Neither Labor nor the LNP want to invest in Moggill
With a state election at the end of October, now is the time to put pressure on both Labor and the LNP to commit to addressing the acute and chronic underfunding of Queensland public schools, and to start plans for the long overdue second high school for Moggill.
I wrote to both the Labor Education Minister, Di Farmer, and the LNP Shadow Education Minister and Member for Moggill, Dr Christian Rowan, asking them to make that commitment.
Ms Farmer has refused to invest in a new high school. She has also failed to commit to meeting the minimum funding our public schools need, saying only that Labor are "committed to all Queensland schools being on a path to 100% of the SRS".
Dr Rowan first bizarrely replied that the Greens are opposed to a high school in Moggill, and failed to commit to the new school under a potential LNP state government, or to fully funding other existing schools in the Moggill electorate. Then just ahead of the state election, under pressure from community campaigning, he announced that the LNP would commit $2million to a business case for a new school. While that's welcome progress, it could still result in a finding from the department that there is no need, and once again the community will be left wanting.
I'll continue to work to secure our school, and our kids, the resources they need to thrive, so we can all look forward to a safe and prosperous future.
The arguments for a Moggill High School
There are multiple benefits to having children attend high school in their community:
- For the students, the reduced commute translates to more time for sleep, study and extracurricular activities, which means better overall wellbeing and better educational outcomes.
- Children also gain the health benefits of walking or cycling to school instead of sitting passively in the back of a car.
- Children are more likely to socialise with other local children, which builds a sense of community and security as they and their parents develop networks of connections in the neighbourhood.
It also means:
- Lower costs for parents and less stress in the mornings (especially for families with multiple children at different schools)
- It is easier for parents to get involved with their child’s education, and be part of the school community.
- For the community, a local high school means greater economic vitality for the area, with job opportunities, higher participation in community events and more money spent in neighbourhood shops.
Well over 1200 high school age children already live in the Moggill-Bellbowrie area, and every day they leave the area, mostly by car down Moggill Rd. That equates to around 30,000 person-kilometres every school day, which is a significant cause of the persistent and dangerous congestion on that road.
Building a high school in Moggill will enable hundreds of families to leave their cars at home, improving the quality of life for everyone on the West Side. The public high schools closest to Moggill - Kenmore State High School and Indooroopilly State High School - are both desperately in need of new buildings as they are already at or over capacity.
Successive refusals from Labor
The community has continued to campaign for the high school for the last 10 years. In 2017 there was a petition on the topic which attracted 1300 signatures. Minister Kate Jones refused the request. After I took office in 2022, I wrote to then Minister Grace Grace, who also refused the request.
The justification given for refusing to even consider a high school in Moggill is Education Qld's planning model. The same planning model that, late last year, caused Indooroopilly State High School parents to beg the department to put demountables on the oval because there was no room for hundreds of students. The school's population far exceeds its capacity, but Education Qld failed to notice. The school is so overcrowded kids can't get to the toilet during recess, or buy food from the tuckshop at lunchtime due to queues. Some kids never get taught in specialist classrooms like science labs or music rooms. Parents in that community are begging the new Minister for Education, Di Farmer, to commit to making that school fit for the students it serves. This commitment has not yet been received.
No commitment from LNP
Since being elected in 2014, the LNP Member for Moggill has supported the community's requests for a school, and more generally for investment in the public schools in his electorate – a positive sign, one would think. He has spoken in Parliament on at least 28 occasions, posted on social media, been interviewed in the media and discussed the issue in his newsletters. As he has also been the Shadow Education Minister since 2020, he is well placed to ensure the LNP will address this decade-old need with a commitment to funding. In July 2024, I wrote to Christian Rowan calling on him to commit to addressing the shortfall in public school funding and to start plans for the high school he knows Moggill needs. He promptly wrote back, but failed to make any commitment. It's disappointing that despite his fine words and his powerful position within his party, holding the relevant portfolio as they plan their election commitments, he will not commit to doing something he was calling urgent 10 years ago, and instead uses twisted logic to claim that The Greens and I oppose a school!
The broken planning scheme
Each refusal is based on the Department of Education's planning scheme - the same scheme that has so spectacularly failed the Indooroopilly State High Community. The planning scheme has many flaws:
- The scheme relies on 2018 population data. In 2021-22 Brisbane recorded the highest population growth of all capital cities. The Brisbane population has grown by at least 200,000 people since 2018, so to continue to assess community needs on data from 2018 is to fail the community.
- The New School Planning Framework uses a narrow set of criteria that means important factors are ignored. Siloed planning without involvement by Transport and Main Roads sees many Ryan schools grappling with unsafe, congested roads and it is left to the volunteers that make up Parents & Citizens Committees to try and navigate bureaucratic buck-passing between that department and the Brisbane City Council.
- The Queensland Schools Planning Reference Committee is (according to its own Terms of Reference) supposed to hold annual meetings to plan for school needs, but this has never occurred. The committee was formed under the Newman administration, and was focused on “future demand mapping for new state and non-state school requirements in collaboration with key stakeholders”. Half of the committee represents private schools, and no public school educators are represented on it.
In June 2024, I wrote to the new Education Minister, Di Farmer, to highlight these problems with their broken planning scheme, and to make the case for building a high school in Moggill. She has now used that same scheme to justify refusing to invest in a new school.
Chronic underfunding of public education
All of these problems come back to years and years of underfunding of public schools. Penny pinching over our kids' education is a false economy: well-funded public education is essential if we want young Australians to grow into healthy, well-rounded adults. At present, 100% of Queensland public schools are under-funded. Some schools are missing out on millions every year.
The problem with school funding
The Gonski Report in 2011 established a formula for school funding. While public schools are receiving significantly less than the minimum required under Gonski, private schools are being given significantly more than the formula requires. 98% of private schools get more than the required funding, while 99% of public schools don’t even get the minimum.
State governments are supposed to fund 80% of the minimum funding required, with the federal government providing the remainder. Queensland public schools only receive 69% of the minimum funding required from our state government – even though the government has boasted about a multi-billion dollar surplus. Our public schools in Queensland are dealing with a shortfall of $1.7 billion a year. Imagine the good that money could do!
In July 2024 I spoke in Parliament (watch the full speech) about how this chronic underfunding leaves our public schools literally begging for resources. Kenmore State High School can only fit 700 of its 2000 students in its hall, meaning they can never hold a whole school assembly. Our primary schools are increasingly overcrowded. The problems this is causing are piling up. And neither of the major parties appear to have any plan to fix that.
Australia was once famed as the country of the fair go, but there is nothing fair about making public schools that are required to cater to all students run cake stalls to fund essentials, yet handing hundreds of millions to exclusive private schools.
Impact on children with higher needs
Of course, the people who bear the brunt of penny-pinching and cost-cutting, are those children with the highest needs. My Greens colleagues Penny Allman-Payne, Michael Berkman and I held an Education Roundtable in April 2024 for parents of children with ADHD, Autism and other conditions that mean they need extra help at school. It is very clear that schools whose resources are already stretched are incapable of providing the education these children need. Parents are being forced to home school, which often means one parent stopping work, and the family losing income is sorely needed to pay medical costs.
The Greens believe in universal free education for life, because we know how fundamental learning is to human wellbeing. Michael Berkman and I wrote to Education Minister Di Farmer in May 2024, highlighting the need for funds to enable staff to be trained, to allow for smaller classes where kids can get more attention, and to promote cultural change to prevent bullying and abuse at school. In July 2024, we received a reply which makes no commitment to additional funding for children with additional needs, and no commitment to fully funding public schools. It says"
"The Queensland and Australian governments have committed to all Queensland state schools being on a path to reach 100% of the SRS." (emphasis added).
When you recall that the SRS (Schools Resourcing Standard) is intended to be the minimum funding to meet the needs of students, this is clearly inadequate. It means that Labor intend for our public schools will continue to be underfunded into the future.
Campaigns to Save Public Schooling
With the state election in October 2024, and a federal election looming (due by May 2025), this is the perfect time to make both major parties aware that you care about public education, and you want them to commit to fully funding our public schools.
Education is, appropriately, a shared responsibility of state and federal governments, so the Greens are working at both levels to address the problem. You can help us by calling for the Qld Government to fully-fund their portion of the budget, and joining Senator Penny Allman-Payne’s campaign to have the federal government ensure that all public schools are fully-funded to the minimum standard required.
If you sign up here, I'll be in touch occasionally to let you know how you can support our campaign for a high school in Moggill.