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28 Jun 10 by John Ross & Julie Hare-CAMPUS REVIEW
Gillard might be our first female PM. She’s also the first PM in 35 years to step up from the education portfolio. But what does it mean?
Last Wednesday was just like any other June day in Canberra. No heat in the air. Political journalists relaxed in Parliament House eateries. The only story doing the rounds was that Jose Ramos-Horta was in town to fight Greater Sunrise’s plans to process gas on a floating platform instead of in East Timor, where people needed jobs.
Prime Minister Rudd’s “persuasive intellect” might be used to influence the outcome, Ramos-Horta said.
But within 24 hours, that persuasive intellect had failed to persuade his colleagues to keep him in his job.
If the media had been talking up a leadership challenge for a couple of months, Canberra insiders hadn’t seen it coming. It’s just noise, they said. There’s no move on Rudd.
But if his successor is Australia’s first female leader, she’s also part of another rare breed – a prime minister who’s done time as an education minister. The only other examples are Malcolm Fraser, who served a couple of stints as education and science minister before he eventually obtained the top job, and John Gorton who filled that portfolio from 1963 to 1968 (including his first few months as prime minister). And, arguably, the 1930s PM Joseph Lyons who was Tasmanian education minister during the First World War.
While Gorton did oversee a substantial expansion of the Commonwealth’s role in education, neither Fraser nor Lyons was renowned for education reforms. But what about Gillard, whose transition from education minister has been immediate?
“I believe fundamentally that the basic education and health services that Australians rely on, and their decent treatment at work, is at risk at the next election,” Gillard told her post-victory press conference.
“It is my intention to lead a government that … will make sure every child gets a fair go in life and a great education.”
But climate change and the resources super profits tax will be the first cabs off the policy rank, she added.
OK, but having Gillard in the Lodge will mean surety for the educational reform program, insiders say. “My assumption is that this is a stabilising force, rather than destabilising,” said Australian Catholic University vice-chancellor Professor Greg Craven.
“The direction of higher education policy is very set, and it’s been set by the Prime Minister. So we can expect continuity. Her elevation to the prime ministership underlines – rather than undermines – the directions in terms of participation, equity and social inclusion.”
Maybe. But on the other hand, tertiary education reform may have lost its champion, as she strides off to bigger and better things. What about the new regulators, still struggling to get established? What about handpicked advisory groups like Skills Australia, now that Gillard has other fish to fry?
Craven agreed there was a danger here. “The workload of the PM is five times the workload of the education minister. You have to think about how long it takes their thought cycle to come back to an issue once they have looked at it. It would be unreasonable of the sector to expect too much.”
OK, but it will still be a pro-education Lodge, insiders say. Gillard has runs on the board. Social inclusion. The education revolution. Hard-edged multi-jurisdictional reform, like the national curriculum and the VET regulator. Great leaps over Commonwealth-state barriers while other portfolios – like health – were taking preliminary measurements.
Maybe. But if you disregard the school building program, it’s all about “disappointed expectations”, said University of Melbourne education professor Simon Marginson.
“What she did was entirely consistent with where the government was at. She didn’t do any more or any less. She made education a headline item for government, and that’s a positive. Expectations were managed really well – built up, built down, fulfilled to the level to which they had been knocked down. It was masterful, because now they don’t need to do anything in universities for the next three to five years.”
OK, but Gillard’s a proper activist, insiders say. “It’s a proud moment having one of our previous presidents as PM,” said the latest National Union of Students president, Carla Drakeford. “It’s a special day for activists. She has been a student activist in the past, and now she’s PM. It’s very heartening to see that progression.”
Maybe. But her left credentials “are not of the old school”, said another insider. “She is, and always has been, much more pragmatic than that. I’m not saying she doesn’t care. But her ideas are more in line with capital theory than the old left.”
Yeah, but she still leans left, some say. Her heart is with her Lalor constituents – social inclusion for the battlers.
Maybe, but she’ll be in lock-step with the state government in her home state of Victoria, others say. The home of contestability, user pays, prime minister’s department head Terry Moran. The Commonwealth and Victoria face elections at about the same time and with about the same prospects of success – so they’ll develop a common narrative.
Yeah, but she cares about international students. Her former department was “at war” with Chris Evans’s immigration department over its hardline stance on student visas, The Australian reported recently.
Maybe, but her factional backers will force her to “lurch to the right” on asylum seeker policies, her predecessor Rudd suggested, the night before he was rolled.
Gillard’s backers came from Labor’s right faction, even though Gillard is with the left. And Rudd might have been right of Gillard, but his backers came from the “hard” left.
.
28 Jun 10 by John Ross & Julie Hare-CAMPUS REVIEW
Gillard might be our first female PM. She’s also the first PM in 35 years to step up from the education portfolio. But what does it mean?
Last Wednesday was just like any other June day in Canberra. No heat in the air. Political journalists relaxed in Parliament House eateries. The only story doing the rounds was that Jose Ramos-Horta was in town to fight Greater Sunrise’s plans to process gas on a floating platform instead of in East Timor, where people needed jobs.
Prime Minister Rudd’s “persuasive intellect” might be used to influence the outcome, Ramos-Horta said.
But within 24 hours, that persuasive intellect had failed to persuade his colleagues to keep him in his job.
If the media had been talking up a leadership challenge for a couple of months, Canberra insiders hadn’t seen it coming. It’s just noise, they said. There’s no move on Rudd.
But if his successor is Australia’s first female leader, she’s also part of another rare breed – a prime minister who’s done time as an education minister. The only other examples are Malcolm Fraser, who served a couple of stints as education and science minister before he eventually obtained the top job, and John Gorton who filled that portfolio from 1963 to 1968 (including his first few months as prime minister). And, arguably, the 1930s PM Joseph Lyons who was Tasmanian education minister during the First World War.
While Gorton did oversee a substantial expansion of the Commonwealth’s role in education, neither Fraser nor Lyons was renowned for education reforms. But what about Gillard, whose transition from education minister has been immediate?
“I believe fundamentally that the basic education and health services that Australians rely on, and their decent treatment at work, is at risk at the next election,” Gillard told her post-victory press conference.
“It is my intention to lead a government that … will make sure every child gets a fair go in life and a great education.”
But climate change and the resources super profits tax will be the first cabs off the policy rank, she added.
OK, but having Gillard in the Lodge will mean surety for the educational reform program, insiders say. “My assumption is that this is a stabilising force, rather than destabilising,” said Australian Catholic University vice-chancellor Professor Greg Craven.
“The direction of higher education policy is very set, and it’s been set by the Prime Minister. So we can expect continuity. Her elevation to the prime ministership underlines – rather than undermines – the directions in terms of participation, equity and social inclusion.”
Maybe. But on the other hand, tertiary education reform may have lost its champion, as she strides off to bigger and better things. What about the new regulators, still struggling to get established? What about handpicked advisory groups like Skills Australia, now that Gillard has other fish to fry?
Craven agreed there was a danger here. “The workload of the PM is five times the workload of the education minister. You have to think about how long it takes their thought cycle to come back to an issue once they have looked at it. It would be unreasonable of the sector to expect too much.”
OK, but it will still be a pro-education Lodge, insiders say. Gillard has runs on the board. Social inclusion. The education revolution. Hard-edged multi-jurisdictional reform, like the national curriculum and the VET regulator. Great leaps over Commonwealth-state barriers while other portfolios – like health – were taking preliminary measurements.
Maybe. But if you disregard the school building program, it’s all about “disappointed expectations”, said University of Melbourne education professor Simon Marginson.
“What she did was entirely consistent with where the government was at. She didn’t do any more or any less. She made education a headline item for government, and that’s a positive. Expectations were managed really well – built up, built down, fulfilled to the level to which they had been knocked down. It was masterful, because now they don’t need to do anything in universities for the next three to five years.”
OK, but Gillard’s a proper activist, insiders say. “It’s a proud moment having one of our previous presidents as PM,” said the latest National Union of Students president, Carla Drakeford. “It’s a special day for activists. She has been a student activist in the past, and now she’s PM. It’s very heartening to see that progression.”
Maybe. But her left credentials “are not of the old school”, said another insider. “She is, and always has been, much more pragmatic than that. I’m not saying she doesn’t care. But her ideas are more in line with capital theory than the old left.”
Yeah, but she still leans left, some say. Her heart is with her Lalor constituents – social inclusion for the battlers.
Maybe, but she’ll be in lock-step with the state government in her home state of Victoria, others say. The home of contestability, user pays, prime minister’s department head Terry Moran. The Commonwealth and Victoria face elections at about the same time and with about the same prospects of success – so they’ll develop a common narrative.
Yeah, but she cares about international students. Her former department was “at war” with Chris Evans’s immigration department over its hardline stance on student visas, The Australian reported recently.
Maybe, but her factional backers will force her to “lurch to the right” on asylum seeker policies, her predecessor Rudd suggested, the night before he was rolled.
Gillard’s backers came from Labor’s right faction, even though Gillard is with the left. And Rudd might have been right of Gillard, but his backers came from the “hard” left.
.
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