Ms Audrey Deane:

I wish to comment on the digital divide which is coming down the tracks with the expansion in the usage of information and communications technologies in the education system. At the moment that market is being run by publishers for profit, which is fine. It is a business model. However, this is about education and it should not be in that domain. We have spoken to the Minister about the degree of practice within the publishing sector. We cannot go into it too much on the record, but there really is a lot of reform needed there. The Society of St. Vincent de Paul is seeking a clear message from the Minister in regard to the leadership he will offer on this issue and his strategic intent to regulate the industry. We would go further in seeking the establishment of a task force incorporating expertise from a range of domains, to report within a short timeframe. Its members would include economists, software developers, education bodies, organisations such as our own and, vitally, parents.

Parents are the missing group in this room. They are being dictated to. They receive another little letter home in a school bag. How many more can we take?

That brings me to my final point. This matter needs to be re-calibrated and reformed. It cannot continue to be the ludicrous condition that a local school principal can decide what is going on at that school. They are in receipt of public funding. That must change. We need parents as partners with the patron bodies and it needs to happen fast.