AUSTRALIAN COUNCIL FOR THE DEFENCE OF GOVERNMENT
SCHOOLS
PRESS RELEASE 414
CATHOLIC EDUCATION SYSTEM
RUSHES TO PROTECT
IT’S PUBLIC FUNDING BASE
WITH ONLY HALF THE STORY
19 January 2011
The National Catholic Education Commission has
reacted to the concerns about the ‘residualisation
and changing socio-economic composition of government schools’ stated by the Gonski School Funding Review (The Age Jan. 17, 2011). On the social issue they claim that the
Catholic system educates more disabled and socially disadvantaged children than
other sectarian schools. However, they are forced to admit that in this regard
they fall behind the public system. So they now claim that they give better
‘value’ for the taxpayer dollar. They quote inadequate if not misleading
statistics. (The Age, January 15,
2011). There is nothing new about this.
There are two major reasons why the Catholic
Education authorities should be confronted as misleading both the panel and
Australian citizens.
1.
Their facts and figures cannot be taken seriously. There is not and never
has been any real public accountability for the billions of taxpayer dollars
poured into this religious institution.
2.
Their facts and figures leave out the billions of dollars of indirect
grants’, namely taxation expenditures incurred through taxation exemptions.
Lack of Accountability 1969-2011
At no time during the last fifty years has a
comprehensive picture been given by either the various Australian governments,
or the sectarian sector, of the total financial cost to the Australian taxpayer
of duplication of public schools by sectarian groups, the major one of which is
the Catholic Church.
In the 1960s the public Treasury was prized
open by the Catholic Church for funding of their educational enterprises. Their
political arm, the DLP gained the balance of power and responsible citizens
were worried about children in ‘poor parish schools’. This was regarded as a
danger to the long-term national good. Wealthy catholic and Protestant schools
were reclassified as ‘needy’ to protect an unholy protestant/Catholic alliance.
DOGS argued that the eventual residualisation and loss of public education – as in other
countries dominated by religious groups – would result. Our predictions have
proved correct. The concept of ‘residualisation’ is
now being referred to by the panel established by the Gillard government to
review school funding.
The myth of the ‘poor parish school’ has long
outworn its usefulness for church authorities. ‘Poor’ children and ‘poorly
resourced’ schools are no longer in the sectarian, but in the public sector.
Yet the Gonski panel is confronted with the simple
fact that billions of dollars of State Aid to sectarian schools later, the
public schools of this country are still attended by at least two thirds of the
nation’s children.
From the very beginning the picture was
muddied as the Catholic Education systems used the “Needs” policy to channel
money into new “needy” schools and diverted public funds from the primary to
the secondary sector. Then the other religious groups learnt to ‘play the
system’.
There is nothing new about the current
inequities in educational funding. It commenced with the Schools Commission in
the 1970’s. The rorting of State Aid and in
particular the ALP “Needs” policy was exposed by the DOGS in the following
Advertisements inserted in newspapers at their own expense in the period 1970
to 1984.
The Age: 12 November 1970;
27 November , 1972, 4; 16 May 1973,
10; 12 July 1973, 14; 12 December 1975,
12 ; 23 June 1977, 16; 2 December 1977; 5 December, 1977, 12; 3 May 1984, 18;
28 November 1984, 20; 1 May 1985; 30 August 1988, 22-23; 2 March 1998, 11;
April 26, 2005; 27 March 2006; The Herald: 1 December 1972, 11; 11 December 1975, 38; The Australian : 10 December 1975, 5;19 July 1985, 7; Canberra Times:
18 December 1980; 4 November 1983,11; 6 April 1984, 9.
The
lack of accountability and transparency was more recently exposed by the DOGS
when they discovered that the checking of the accuracy of enrolment figures
provided by the private sector by the federal department of education is a bad
joke, each school undergoing an accuracy check once every 50 years.
See
Press Release 256 at www.adogs.info/pr256.htm.
Also see Press Release 238 at www.adogs.info/pr238.htm
and Press Release 246 at www.adogs.info/pr246.htm
and 266 at www.adogs.info/pr266.htm
. The Auditor General made a few feeble noises
in a June 2008 report. The silence from the government has been deafening.
The latest argument in the Church’s armory is
that their schools are more efficient and cost less than public schools.
Does this mean that they are getting ready for
a takeover or a makeover?
2. Taxation Expenditures through
Taxation Exemptions.
There has never been any calculation of the total
cost to the taxpayer of the subsidization of private sectarian institutions.
For example, there has never been any calculation of
1.
The private resources of religious institutions available to their
schools which are exempt from taxation.
2.
The private contributions of parents available to the private sectarian
sector, but returned through personal taxation exemptions.
3.
And last, but not least, the taxation expenditures involved in the myriad
of taxation exemptions at all levels of government available to the private
sector because, unlike the public sector, the6y are charities’. To give just a
few examples – the exemption from payroll tax, GST, income tax, fringe benefits
tax, capital gains tax, land tax, municipal rates and so on...Even wealthy
parents, if they can pay substantial school fees get a lot of education
expenditure back on the taxation merry-go-round.
The third, indirect subsidization through
taxation exemptions of the Catholic Education system in particular, and the
Church in general, is very extensive. It indicates that any direct grants to
which the sector refers is but the tip of a very large iceberg of taxpayer
subsidies.
According to the Business Review Weekly of March 24-30 2005 [1] taxation expenditure
on ‘charities’ constitute a $70 billion third sector of the Australian economy.
These taxation expenditures are listed and analysed in a book published in December 2007 by Max
Wallace entitled ‘The Purple Economy.’ He defines the Purple Economy as ‘the wealth
generated by the eternal mass exemption from taxation of religious
organizations, their subsidiaries and their charitable arms.’ Max Wallace
argues that democracies should be characterized by constitutional separation of
church and state. He also argues it is not the role of a state to ‘advance
religion’ through the myriad of tax breaks that supernatural organizations
receive by virtue of centuries old charity law. These are tithes by stealth
imposed on secular taxpayers without their consent. The book concludes that
supernatural organizations should pay tax like any other corporation with the
same deductions allowable for charitable work.
Conclusion:
Following
the dissenting judgement of Justice Lionel Murphy in the DOGS case of 1981,
DOGS contend that State Aid to religious institutions is unconstitutional under
Section 116 of the Constitution. If it continues, then the Catholic Education
sector and the Church itself should be either subject to a public audit, and
proper accountability, or, if this is not possible, public funding should be
withdrawn.
Any argument
about the cost to the taxpayer of the extensive subsidisation of the sectarian
sector of education should be hedged about with the proper facts and figures
based upon both direct grants and taxation expenditures entailed through
taxation exemptions to the ‘charitable’ sector. Any claims made by the
subsidised sectarian sector that they are ‘better value for taxpayer’s money’
than the public sector should be treated by the Gonski
committee with the disbelief it deserves.
Listen to the DOGS program
3CR, 855 on
the A.M. dial
12 Noon
Saturdays
[1] Business Review Weekly , March 24-30, 2005; ‘Inside Charities Inc.,’ Business Review Weekly, June 20-July 5, 2006;