Regulations campaign wrapup

HEN has a long and proud history of standing up for home educators rights. With new Education Regulations developed, HEN’s lobbying resulted in a disallowance motion being put in the Legislative Council on 23/8. Unfortunately, the vote was 20:20 so the motion was lost by 1 cross-bench vote. You can read the actual debate in Hansard (see p4307)

Be proud – there are many positives

• The government know we are politically engaged and capable of running a highly effective campaign – ignoring us is risky.
• We pushed them into several things they did not intend:
  • The creation of a Victorian Home Education Advisory Committee
  • HEN has a place on the interview panel for VRQA employees
  • HEN will run a training session for VRQA employees
  • HEN will address the VRQA board.
  • Academic, Glenda Jackson, will run a session for DET on home education research
• It is highly unusual for an opposition to attempt a disallowance motion. We did well to convince the Liberal Nationals to put the motion forward and it came very close to success.
• The Liberal Nationals have given us strong public support. Their home education policy for the next election will be well-informed.
• We have impressive support from the minor parties.
• Our campaign successfully demonstrated home education spans the political spectrum. Home education has never had left wing support before.
• We’ve raised the profile of home education with an incredible 40 articles/segments
• We’ve broken down many home education stereotypes and myths.

So while our efforts may not have won the big prize, there are many very significant gains for us to build on.

What Happens Next?
Our campaign has won us input on the detail and HEN will be there to help you adapt to the new requirements when they become public. Stay tuned!