Equality in education is a dying concept

03/07/2008 10:37. The Rudd Government has picked up where Howard left off.

T HE education revolution promised by Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard during last year's election campaign wasn't meant to be taken seriously.

According to international comparisons by the OECD, the outstanding characteristic of the Australian education system is that it rates very highly in terms of efficiency as measured by overall literacy and numeracy skills (fourth out of 30 countries) but rather poorly in terms of equity (18th out of 30 countries).

The Rudd Government's education policy is a seamless continuation of the policies of the Howard government. In 2006, the then education minister, Julie Bishop, said

the education debate had "moved on from questions of resourcing. The new frontier in education reform in Australia... // WA today