Andrew Barr
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Andrew Barr is an Australian politician. He has been an Australian Labor Party member for the seat of Molonglo in the Australian Capital Territory Legislative Assembly since 5 April 2006, after being elected on a countback to replace former Treasurer Ted Quinlan, who resigned mid-term. Barr is the territory's Education and Training Minister, having been immediately promoted to Cabinet upon his election. He is the first openly gay MP in the ACT and the first openly gay Cabinet member anywhere in Australia.
School Closures controversy - Andrew Barr has been dubbed the Minister for School Closures as almost immediately upon gaining entry to Parliament he announced plans to close 39 schools in the ACT despite the absence of any such policy statement at the 2004 election and therefore no mandate from the ACT electorate for such action. On 13 December 2006 after a controversial consultation period Barr announced that 23 schools would close creating great division in Canberra. The consultation process and announcement has raised considerable ire in the ACT community as many of the affected schools are not in Barr's own electorate and many affected communities consider the process was neither genuine or lawful. In addition Barr announced a $750 transition fee will be payable to students whose schools are closing and this has been interpreted by the media and campaigners as an electoral bribe. Submissions to the school closure proposal requested that each school facing closure justify why it should stay open however no specific criteria for schools to address were provided and when the decision was made specific reasons were not provided as to why some schools were saved and other doomed to close. Campaigners against this process are considering legal action and standing candidates against the ALP at the next ACT election scheduled for 2008.
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[edit] Biography
Barr was born in Lismore, New South Wales in 1973, but was raised in Canberra, attending the AME School, Turner Primary School, Lyneham High School and Lake Ginninderra College. He studied political science, economics and economic history at the Australian National University, where he became involved in student politics, serving as Treasurer of the Australian National University Students' Association and as a director on the board of the Australian National University Union. After graduating in 1995, he worked for federal MP Annette Ellis and (then) ACT Opposition Leader Jon Stanhope before embarking on a career change to the private sector in 1999 as a media analyst and account manager. He returned to politics in 2002 as Senior Adviser to Government Whip John Hargreaves. Following Hargreaves' election to the Ministry in November 2004, as Minister for Police and Emergency Services, Barr was appointed chief-of-staff - a position he held until his election to parliament in April 2006.
[edit] Australian Capital Territory legislative election, 2004
In early 2004, Barr successfully won pre-selection for the Labor ticket in the seven-member Molonglo electorate, which includes Barr's suburb of Braddon. He campaigned largely on financial management, housing affordability and urban infrastructure issues, such as balanced territory budgets, tax concessions for first home buyers, inner city parking permits and footpath and street lighting upgrades, while also expressing support for gay law reform, the reproductive rights of women, multiculturalism and refugees. Barr polled strongly in inner city booths and ultimately found himself in contention for the seventh and final Molonglo seat, along with Liberals Jacqui Burke and Zed Seselja and fellow Labor candidate Mike Hettinger, but narrowly missed out, coming in ninth overall.
Barr continued working for Hargreaves after the election, but received a second chance at entering the Assembly when Treasurer Ted Quinlan, a close political ally, resigned for health and personal reasons in March 2006. The resulting countback saw the redistribution of Quinlan's first preference votes, and as the two had campaigned together, Barr was the favourite to take the seat from the beginning. He ultimately finished with 5318 votes, a significant majority of 1089 over nearest rival Kim Sattler (who, in a surprise result, outpolled Hettinger).
Quinlan's resignation from the Assembly sparked a ministerial reshuffle, and Barr was heavily tipped to take Quinlan's place in the ministry. He duly nominated for the position, easily outpolling fellow MLAs Karin MacDonald and Mary Porter. As a result, he immediately entered the ministry upon taking his seat, and was assigned the education, training, industrial relations, sport and tourism portfolios. Barr dedicated most of his maiden speech to economic management, housing affordability and progressive social reform.
[edit] 2006: Education and Training Portfolio
When Katy Gallagher was promoted to Deputy Chief Minister in April 2006, she also switched from education to health, which freed her former portfolio for newly elected MP Andrew Barr.
With the territory budget known to be severely in deficit at the time of assuming his ministerial responsibilities, Barr was immediately thrown into a difficult position, as it became clear that he would have to preside over major cuts to services in his respective portfolios. This was most clearly felt in education, as one of Barr's first public announcements was that school and preschool closures had become inevitable - an issue not raised in the territory since a plan to close eight schools in 1991 brought down the Kaine government. The announcement has met with significant concern from community councils, and Barr made no announcement prior to the 2006-07 Australian Capital Territory budget of 6 June 2006. Barr had stated that no specific schools are planned for closure at this point, and that selling the sites of closed schools is "not on the agenda".[citation needed]
Barr's new responsibilities also included taking over the government's negotiations aiming to keep the Kangaroos Football Club playing home games at Manuka Oval in Canberra. He has also been a vocal supporter of the territory's planned same-sex civil unions bill.
[edit] 2006-07 Australian Capital Territory budget
The 2006-07 Australian Capital Territory budget announcements on 6 June included the planned closure of 39 schools in the Territory[1] as part of the ACT Government's "Towards 2020: Renewing Our Schools" vision for education in the Territory.[2]
[edit] References
- ^ "Budget's school closures shock parents", ABC News Online, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 2006-06-06. Retrieved on 2006-06-09.
- ^ Towards 2020: Renewing Our Schools. ACT Department of Education and Training (2006). Retrieved on 2006-06-10.
