2GB Steve Price

E&OE TRANSCRIPT 2GB Afternoons with Steve Price Date 14 January 2014 SUBJECTS: National Curriculum; Holden STEVE PRICE: …could be wanting to sell off Australia Post. The Snowy River scheme could be up for sale. It's a national debate that we have to have. The other national debate we're seeing take off is this debate about education in general and the curriculum in particular. Now, that's what taught in schools. I'd like your view this afternoon on whether you think what's being taught currently to your children or grandchildren in our state curriculums is what they should be being taught, particularly in the areas of history and in the area of religion. Now, already we've got a group of academics and teachers and principals. They're starting to flex their muscles, opposing any curriculum review. They've bagged the pair that have been chosen by Education Minister, Chris Pyne, to conduct the inquiry. Now, this is one of the great cultural wars that we're going to have here and it seems the Abbott Government is up for a stoush. Who knows? They may even have the appetite to take on the ABC, which I'm sure I'll talk with my mate Andrew Bolt when he and I rejoin each other next week at 8 o'clock. Now, you know you're doing something right when Greens Senator Richard Di Natale starts complaining about the review. And he uses the use of the Lord's Prayer in Parliament – Federal Parliament – as the reason why we shouldn't be looking at how religion is taught in schools. [Excerpt from interview] RICHARD DI NATALE: I note that the review into the national curriculum commissioned by Christopher Pyne, by Kevin Donnelly, has made reference to the fact that we need to ensure that there's greater religious teaching, particularly religious teaching around Judeo-Christian traditions in schools. And I note that Kevin Donnelly uses as a justification for that the fact that the Lord's Prayer is said in the Australian Parliament to commence each parliamentary sitting day. Well, I have to say, as somebody who was brought up in the Catholic tradition, coming to the Parliament for the very first time and starting my Parliamentary day with the Lord's Prayer took me back to my year nine religious class and I thought I was in the Australian Parliament. [End of excerpt] STEVE PRICE: Yes, Christopher Pyne is the Education Minister. He's on the line. Nice to talk to you again. Happy New Year. CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Thank you, Steve. Same to you and to all your listeners. STEVE PRICE: What's your view on religious instruction in schools? CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, what Kevin Donnelly was talking about, which was perfectly sensible, and if Richard Di Natale looked at the entire quote, he was talking about the need to understand where we've come from as a nation. And that, for example, he said, religious history, religious attitudes, should not be absent from the curriculum. And he also said that was Judeo-Christian, Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim, Jewish, so in fact he had the whole list of world religions. But the Greens have coincidentally left all the others out except Judeo-Christian heritage. STEVE PRICE: I send my children to a fee-paying Anglican school, so I know where they're going. What is the current situation in state-based schools in regard to religious instruction? CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, every state and territory is slightly different. STEVE PRICE: Which is crazy. CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Some states and territories have a ban on the religious instruction in schools. STEVE PRICE: A ban? CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Yeah, some states and territories don't have any organised religious instruction in schools. Other states and territories are more flexible and leave it up to the principal or the staff to make those determinations themselves. But effectively, religion is not supposed to be part of the state curriculum, because – in state schools – because they are by their nature not religious institutions. STEVE PRICE: But when you and I went to school we had religious instruction. CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, I went to a public school and then I went to a Catholic school and I'm afraid I certainly had plenty of religious instruction in the Catholic school and I can't… STEVE PRICE: Well, we had it in primary school, didn't we? CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Casting my mind back to my youth, Steve, I can't remember. STEVE PRICE: You and I both went to school in South Australia. We had religious instruction. CHRISTOPHER PYNE: All right. Well, I'll take your word for it. I went to Burnside Demonstration School, so… STEVE PRICE: All right. I went to Seacombe, I went to Darlington Primary. CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Right. STEVE PRICE: I'm sure we had religious instruction there. CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Yes, and you're probably younger than me, so… STEVE PRICE: Oh, no. Oh, no. I wish. [Laughter] STEVE PRICE: Are you encouraged by the comments today by Tony Milner, the Basham Professor of Asian History at ANU, who said that he's backing the Coalition's review of the national curriculum, arguing, it's only when we understand ourselves first that we should learn about Asia? CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, he is simply stating common sense and the Government is trying to state common sense as well. There shouldn't be any controversy about the Government wanting to make sure that our students have the highest quality curriculum possible and that they know where we've come from. And I've said day in, day out for the last few days, of course we need to know about the mistreatment of indigenous Australians, but we also need to know about the benefits that western civilisation have brought to us as a society, which has made us the kind of country we are today. That is an entirely non-controversial statement and anybody who takes exception to that is effectively saying they don't think Australian students should know where we've come from. And if you don't know where we've come from, how can you know where we're going? That doesn't mean that you exclude all other aspects of history, English, maths and science because of Western civilisation. But how can you teach the history of Australia without knowing why our country is the way it is today? STEVE PRICE: I note that there's an open letter today signed by 170 teachers, principals and academics… CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Mm hmm. STEVE PRICE: …arguing that this should not happen. CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Mm. STEVE PRICE: And there's this rather strange line about how the curriculum was recast five years ago, but many of the states have not implemented that five-year change. What's taken five years? CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, I think some of the states, like New South Wales in particular – although you're of course welcome to ask Adrian Piccoli specifically why – but I understand New South Wales has not been entirely comfortable with the national curriculum. That they're very proud of their own New South Wales curriculum, especially in history, and that they have taken longer than others to adjust the curriculum to the way they think it should be developed for New South Wales, which is entirely their right to do that as a sovereign state. And I think that's why it's taken longer in New South Wales. The point I make to those 176 teachers and academics is that the fact that some states have been uncomfortable about aspects of the curriculum is one of the reasons why we need to have a review of it, to make sure that the curriculum is as robust and as high quality as it needs to be to put students first. We should never settle for second best, Steve, in this country in our education, whether it's principal autonomy, teacher quality, curriculum and parental engagement. And we're getting on with the promises that I made in the election that we do in education. STEVE PRICE: Am I being naïve or missing something here? Why don't we have a true national curriculum? Why do we need different curriculums for different states? CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Because the states and territories own and operate the schools and so, therefore, traditionally they have been free to make their own decisions about their curriculum. There was a decision made during the Howard Government that we would try and implement a national curriculum. Julia Gillard took that over as the Education Minister when Kevin Rudd won in 2007 and then she implemented the first stage in 2010. And that will be extended. It's currently in English, maths, science and history, but there are plans to extend that to four or five more subjects and then more subjects beyond that. Eventually all the curriculum will be uniform across Australia, but each state and territory will still, of course, control their own schools. STEVE PRICE: An e-mailer says - [Jennice 0:07:50] - I heard you say, talking to Christopher Pyne, is he going to do anything about the rubbish ABC program Behind The News? Have a look at the episode that was fed to my granddaughter early in December regarding Tony Abbott's inability to say sorry to Indonesians, but Kevin Rudd found it so easy to say sorry to the Aborigines. CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Yes, well, that has been raised with me by many people, Steve, about Behind The News. There was a time when Behind The News was a very valuable program and I fought to save it from ABC cuts. Because I've been in Parliament so long, that would probably be about 10 years ago. But I haven't seen that particular edition. It's just another example of why public broadcasters need to be very careful to leave their political bias at the door, rather than publish it, and I would urge the ABC to always be very careful about what they're publishing, especially to children. STEVE PRICE: Just before I let you go, as a South Australian Federal MP, are you keeping a watch on the situation with Holden and the comments being made by the South Australian Premier Jay Weatherill? CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Well, Jay Weatherill's been completely humiliated today, because Stefan Jacoby, the man from General Motors in Detroit who made the decision to close the plants in Melbourne and Adelaide, has said that it had absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the Federal Government. And no amount of money – no amount of money at all – from the Federal Government would have changed their decision. Which is in stark contrast with the claims that Jay Weatherill has been making. I've called on him today to apologise to the workers at Holden for using their suffering to try and save his own political hide in the coming South Australian state election. But I doubt that he'll do that. It's high time that whingeing Weatherill got on with grasping the future of our state in our own hands, rather than trying to blame Canberra for the twelve years of the last Labor Government in our state. STEVE PRICE: Aren't you pleased you're not there today in your home town? Forty-one degrees. CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Yes, I'm in Canberra and I've – my wife and four children are not as pleased that I'm in Canberra. STEVE PRICE: No, I bet. Good on you. Nice to talk to you again. Thanks for your time. CHRISTOPHER PYNE: Thanks, Steve. Bye. STEVE PRICE: Christopher Pyne there. Twenty-four minutes past two. Ends