Our plan to return Australia to a top 10 education nation

A quality education is the most powerful gift we can give our children. It unlocks opportunity, instils confidence, and equips young Australians with the resilience to deal with setbacks and the perseverance to realise their aspirations.

Every young Australian deserves to reach their potential, supported by a world-class education system.

Whilst Commonwealth funding per student has more than doubled in the last two decades, our school performance continues to go backwards.

In 2006, Australia was ranked a ‘top ten’ education nation by the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA).

But in less than two decades, Australia has slipped from 6^th to 12^th in reading, 6^th to 10^th in science and 8^th to 16^th in mathematics.

Under Labor, school standards keep declining.

One in three children is failing to meet basic NAPLAN proficiency levels in reading, writing, and maths.
Nationally, results declined in 12 out of 20 NAPLAN domains between 2023 and 2024.
Today’s average Year 10 student is one year behind in their learning compared with two decades ago.
In government schools, attendance has plummeted in the last five years, with only 56.3 per cent of students attending school more than 90 per cent of the time.

The Coalition is determined to reverse this decline. Our plan will focus on a back-to-basics approach to reading, writing, maths and science, underpinned by proven and successful teaching methods, such as explicit instruction – where concepts are clearly and methodically explained and practiced.

We will guarantee increased funding for schools and ensure that every dollar is directed to better results, higher standards, and classrooms where every student is engaged in learning.

We will ensure classrooms are places of education – not indoctrination, with schools supported by an evidence-based, knowledge-rich curriculum which maximises student learning outcomes and fosters critical thinking, responsible citizenship, and common-sense –reflecting the expectations of parents. For our children’s future, we want Australia’s education system to return to being among the world’s best. Getting Australia’s education system back on track means getting back to basics, and our plan will help return Australia to a top ten education nation.

Our Plan

1. Back to basics to raise education standards

A Dutton Coalition Government will deliver a back-to-basics agenda in our classrooms, prioritising reading, writing, maths and science, especially in the early years of schooling.
We will drive explicit instruction and other evidence-based teaching practices in every classroom to help every student reach their full potential.

Boosting early years literacy and numeracy

Early literacy is critical which is why the former Coalition Government prioritised the teaching of phonics in the Australian Curriculum and introduced the Year 1 Phonics Check.

A Dutton Coalition Government will:

Prioritise a new Literacy and Numeracy Guarantee, where all Australian schools will provide simple, early assessments of Year 1 students which help teachers identify whether children are developing foundational reading and maths skills. These checks are a vital tool for teachers to identify and remedy learning difficulties as soon as they emerge.
Back parents to teach kids to read at home under our $3.8 million Ready to Read Program, serving local communities which need it most and benefitting 12,500 children. Ready to Read will provide a book every month to young children in disadvantaged communities, encouraging parents to read to their children and boosting early years literacy and school readiness.

Fast-tracking explicit instruction

Evidence shows that children learn best when they are taught explicitly – when a concept is explained, modelled and then practiced by students. High-performing schools consistently use this evidence-based approach in well-managed, orderly classrooms.

For example, adopting explicit instruction within the Melbourne Archdiocese Catholic Schools’ network of 300 schools has seen an improvement of more than 20 per cent in numeracy skills in the first 12 months. The Tasmanian and New South Wales governments are also focusing on explicit instruction and literacy in their respective syllabuses.

Explicit teaching is also shown in research to support diverse learners by providing consistent, focused instruction. It offers clear direction, minimises confusion, and helps students build a strong foundation of knowledge.

A Dutton Coalition Government will:

Deliver a $20 million Explicit Teaching Accelerator Fund over three years. This fund will identify and back initiatives which drive the take-up of explicit teaching practices and professional development of educators.

Equipping teachers with the knowledge, skills and resources to use evidence-based teaching approaches will have the greatest influence on student progress and achievement.

Combatting classroom disruption

We recognise that parents have the most important to play in instilling respect, resilience and positive behaviours from the earliest years, reinforcing the standards expected in Australian classrooms.

The behaviour and order of classrooms is critical for an environment of learning.

But classroom disruption is on the rise across Australia, with teachers reporting more frequent behavioural issues that interrupt learning. From minor interruptions to extreme threats of violence, many schools are struggling to maintain calm, focused environments where students and teachers can thrive.

One in four teachers felt unsafe at work in 2022, primarily attributed to student behaviour.

Alarmingly, half of Australia’s school principals reported being physically assaulted last year – the highest rate in 14 years. Many say they are now planning to leave the profession early.

Internationally, Australia now ranks 71st out of 80 countries on school disciplinary climate, highlighting growing concerns about classroom behaviour.

The Coalition led a Senate inquiry into the issue of increasing disruption in Australian school classrooms. Unfortunately, Labor has not acted on the inquiry’s recommendations.

The inquiry highlighted the need for a behaviour curriculum: an explicit approach which gives all students, especially those at risk of disengagement, a clear framework of expectations, helping them to build confidence, make better choices, and stay connected to school and community life.

By explicitly teaching positive behaviour, respect, responsibility, and self-discipline from a young age, schools can help support parents to shape attitudes and values before negative behaviours become entrenched.

A Dutton Coalition Government will:

Implement a national behaviour survey in schools, to understand the frequency and impact of classroom disruption.
Introduce a national behaviour curriculum to support teachers to restore order to classrooms and support better learning outcomes. A behaviour curriculum sets clear, consistent expectations for student conduct and explicitly teaches routines, manners, and respectful interactions to create calm, focused learning environments.

Supporting Indigenous students from remote communities

A Dutton Coalition Government will prioritise improving the rates of Indigenous school attendance and retention. Just over half of Indigenous students complete Year 12, and attendance in very remote areas is as low as 46 per cent.

Recognising the unique challenges facing students in remote communities, boarding schools play a vital role in providing access and opportunity to high quality education.

The Coalition has a strong track record of supporting boarding school facilities for Indigenous students from remote communities. We believe boarding can be a life-changing opportunity for Indigenous students, offering a high-quality education, strong pastoral care and tailored wraparound support.

We will strengthen pathways that open doors to brighter futures and real opportunity.

A Dutton Coalition Government will:

Deliver a $100 million Remote Indigenous Student Success Boarding Fund to ensure more young Indigenous Australians have access to quality education, regardless of where they live. It is estimated these investments will support an additional 660 young Indigenous Australians from remote communities to access a quality education.
Deliver an additional $15.9 million for the Indigenous Boarding Providers Grants Program, which currently supports around 2,500 students attending more than 40 boarding schools and stand-alone boarding facilities to deliver wrap-around supports.

Ensure students and teachers are supported by a common-sense national curriculum

A strong Australian Curriculum is essential in setting the benchmark in achievement standards for all students at all year levels. But our national curriculum is too complex.

Many primary school principals say it is simply impossible to teach.

The current national curriculum spans, for Mathematics alone, (when all materials are printed) an unmanageable 3,500 pages.

In high-performing education systems like the United Kingdom and Singapore, the curriculum focuses on essential subjects and clearly outlines what students should learn each year. The United Kingdom has a specific behaviour curriculum which is focused on teaching students how to behave and learn effectively.

Meanwhile, fewer than 30 per cent of Australian Year 10 students meet the national proficiency standard in civics and citizenship.

High quality curriculum materials for teachers are also crucial to the delivery of high-quality teaching and save teachers hours of preparation and research time each week.

With no single source of assurance as to the quality of curriculum materials, schools are left grappling trying to assess the best resources to adopt and deliver in the classroom.

A Dutton Coalition Government will appoint an expert panel to conduct a targeted review of the Australian Curriculum focused on moving, in partnership with the states and territories, to a simplified, knowledge-rich, evidence-based curriculum which aligns with international best-practice, focused on what students should learn each year in each subject.

The targeted review will also inform how the Government could establish a star rating system for curriculum materials to make it easier for parents and schools to identify and select high quality, evidence-based resources. If implemented, this could help reduce teacher workloads and provide confidence to parents.

2. Back world-class teacher training

The Coalition believes every child deserves a skilled, confident teacher at the front of their classroom. The Commonwealth invests around $800 million per year in education degrees. But universities are letting future teachers down.

University teaching degrees often focus too much on theory, leaving graduates underprepared for real classroom challenges like teaching literacy, numeracy and behaviour management. Entry standards for teaching courses have also fallen. Teacher education must be consistent, ensuring academic preparedness so that students achieve the best outcomes.

Some areas of teacher shortage are more acute than others. Top engineers and scientists say we have a mathematics crisis which has reached a tipping point, warning Australia’s ability to compete globally will be hamstrung if we don’t lift the number of teenagers studying high-level maths.

Teacher shortages have been exacerbated by universities choosing to move from one-year Graduate Diploma of Education programs to two-year Masters programs. This has served as a disincentive for those with existing qualifications in another field to take up teaching.

Without better training from our universities, evidence-based teaching materials such as lesson plans, and ongoing professional development, teachers cannot excel.

The Coalition backed successful programs which target mid-career professionals undertaking education degrees. Teach for Australia has now graduated more than 1,600 teachers, and 87 per cent of alumni continue to work in the education sector.

A Dutton Coalition Government will:

Tackle the teacher shortage by working with universities to offer more one-year postgraduate teaching qualifications for mid-career professionals. This will allow universities to attract the best talent, get teachers in the classroom sooner and reduce the significant financial burden of studying full-time for two years to qualify as a teacher.
Establish a new Teacher Training Accreditation Board to accredit all teacher training university qualifications and micro credentials. Accreditation will set minimum standards for what universities and training providers must deliver.
For post-graduate qualifications, priority accreditation will be given to Graduate Diplomas of Education to incentivise universities to reinstate these programs.
Deliver a new targeted Teach Maths for Australia program to recruit, place and train 105 new secondary maths teachers and 365 additional teachers in Teach for Australia’s proven pathway.
Work in government to expand employment-based pathways for trainee teachers, particularly where they can be supported to work in classrooms part-time from the commencement of their university studies.

3. Support parental choice

A Dutton Coalition Government will back faith-based education – not attack it – because we believe every Australian family has the right to choose a school which aligns to their values.

The Coalition values all faith-based communities and believes they have the same rights to safety, security and prosperity – whether that be Australians of Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Jewish, or other faiths.

Many schools across Australia, including government schools, have been granted deductible gift recipient (DGR) status, which allows tax deductible donations to support school building, library and scholarship funds.

Alarmingly, a review Labor commissioned recommended the removal of DGR status for schools and organisations which provide religious education and other charitable services. This proposal is a blatant ideological attack which would devastate low fee-paying non-government schools to the tune of $3 billion by slashing their ability to fund essential infrastructure and construct new buildings.

A Dutton Coalition Government will:

Ensure access to any new programs are ‘sector-blind’, including Commonwealth teaching scholarships.
Support the establishment of Australia’s first Hindu school.
Deliver $25 million to fund more than 600 community language schools which educate 90,000 Australians around the country.
Deliver up to $22 million to support South Australian non-government schools to offer a mid-year Reception intake to give students extra support while a long-term funding solution to this unique and longstanding practice is developed.
Commit up to $40 million towards increasing the Basic Boarding Allowance paid under the Assistance for Isolated Children Scheme, to help parents and carers with the costs of sending their children to boarding school when there is no school close to home.
Defend and retain the DGR status for schools and religious organisations so that funds used by government and non-government schools are protected.

Investing in School Chaplaincy

School chaplains do an incredible job in Australian schools supporting students’ wellbeing and mental health and in combating bullying.

Across the country, school chaplains continue to meet the immediate and growing needs of students and families. One of the ways they do this is through chaplain-run breakfast clubs – the combined efforts of school chaplains in over 3,000 public schools has seen more than 3.7 million meals served to students by a school chaplain.

Demand for chaplaincy services is rising, particularly in a cost-of-living crisis of Labor’s making, with some states seeing a 27 per cent increase in students needing support.

A Dutton Coalition Government will:

Increase support for the National School Chaplaincy Program and apply indexation to the program from 1 January 2023 which will allow funding to keep up with delivery costs.

Supporting children with additional needs

The AEIOU Foundation for Children with Autism provides exceptional support for families with specialised early learning care for high-needs children. Their model focuses on providing intensive, evidence-based education and therapy services tailored specifically to young children with complex developmental needs.

Children with severe Global Development Delay (GDD) and autism require specialised early learning and care services that exceed the capacity of mainstream childcare providers. Currently, no government funding mechanism supports this high-needs cohort, eliminating viable childcare options.

A Dutton Coalition Government will:

Support the AEIOU Foundation to address the critical gap in early learning support for children with severe GDD and autism.
Invest $35 million into a three-year pilot program to provide targeted funding to ensure that these children receive the targeted interventions needed to thrive.

4. Protect children from bullying and online harm

Protecting children from social media is one of the defining issues of our era. In no other generation have children been exposed to so much damaging material at such a young age.

The Coalition established the world’s first eSafety Commissioner to keep children safe online, cracked down on cyberbullying, and passed tough new laws holding tech giants to account.

A Dutton Coalition Government will continue to lead the way in protecting children from online harm and bullying. Our policies will focus on creating safer digital environments, empowering parents and give every Australian child a better chance to learn and thrive free from bullying, harassment and the dangers of the online world.

A Dutton Coalition Government will:

Adopt a zero-tolerance of bullying in schools including developing a National School Bullying Code to ensure that every school meets minimum standards in preventing and responding to bullying, whether it be in the classroom, the school yard or online.
Support the national ban on mobile phones in schools to cut distraction, improve learning, and protect students from online abuse.
Restrict access to social media for under 16s to keep children safe online.
Provide $6 million to the Alannah & Madeline Foundation to keep our children safe from online harm. The Foundation’s eLearning tools include a set of age-appropriate teaching and learning resources focussed on essential online safety, digital and media literacy skills for children aged 4 to 16.

5. Build a national network of Australian Technical Colleges

Not enough students are taking up the skills we need to solve urgent national challenges.

In France and Germany up to 50 per cent of students take up critical skills pathways in schools, yet in Australia, just one per cent of secondary school students take up a school-based apprenticeship. This imbalance is leaving Australia short of the skilled trades we need to address the current housing crisis and other key priorities.

The truth is we do not have a pipeline of skills in schools that can boost our construction workforce and develop the critical skills we need to support strategic priorities like housing construction, defence, national security and nuclear energy.

The Coalition will invest in building the workforce we need to tackle Australia’s skills challenges head-on.

A Dutton Coalition Government will:

Deliver 12 new national Australian Technical Colleges to boost the number of kids taking up trades through school-based apprenticeships and traineeships.
Deliver a new national Skills in Schools Strategy to identify the best approaches and work with states and territories to boost skills training in our schools.

6. Guarantee school funding agreements

A Dutton Coalition Government will match dollar-for-dollar the school funding agreements announced by the Commonwealth.

We will hold the states and territories to account if they fail to deliver the necessary reforms to raise school standards in every classroom.

Under the previous Coalition Government, annual school funding nearly doubled – from $13 billion in 2013 to over $25 billion in 2022. In real terms, the greatest growth was in Government schools – where Commonwealth funding grew by 58.4 per cent per student in real terms between 2013 and 2022.

A Dutton Coalition Government will guarantee school funding agreements and increase school funding.

The Choice

A Dutton Coalition Government has a clear plan for common-sense, evidence-based reforms to return Australia to a top ten education nation by 2035.

Labor has set no ambition for the future and lacks the urgency that our children deserve.

Since 2022, Labor has established 19 separate education reviews to hear ideas, rather than making decisions. Labor has spent the last three years talking but not delivering.

Labor has failed to make the tough calls needed to lift education standards.

Labor has shamelessly attacked Australian faith communities and failed to stand up to antisemitism in school and university settings. They have failed to rule out taxing organisations which deliver religious education in schools and attacked religious freedoms through their proposed legislation which will take schools of faith backwards and not forwards.

Learning from countries which have led improved student achievement, especially the UK, the Australian Government needs to focus on explicit instruction and evidence-based teaching; a knowledge-rich curriculum and classrooms without disruption.

If elected, a Dutton Coalition Government will increase school funding.

This builds on our record of delivering record investments to all schools. The previous Coalition Government nearly doubled annual school funding – from $13 billion in 2013 to over $25 billion in 2022.

The Coalition has the strength and vision to lift student achievement and restore excellence in education. We want to reduce disruptive behaviour, improve school attendance and boost learning outcomes, keeping more young people on a positive path. Only a Dutton Coalition Government will get our education system back on track.