School demountables to go under $1.4b Labor classroom pledge

Labor will today make one of its biggest election pledges by vowing to spend $1.4 billion replacing ageing demountables with airconditioned “bricks and mortar classrooms”. INTERACTIVE: IS YOUR SCHOOL ON THE LIST

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One in five demountables will be replaced with an airconditioned “bricks and mortar” classroom under a record $1.4 billion Labor pledge to fix NSW’s public schools.

In one of the biggest education commitments of the State election, Labor leader Michael Daley will tackle the practice of jamming playgrounds with temporary classrooms, promising to replace 1000 of the prefabricated buildings in the most overcrowded schools.

Deployed to accommodate fluctuating school enrolments, demountables have long been a hot-button election issue with parents and teachers complaining about extreme temperatures together with shrinking play spaces for students.

Epping West Public School has 30 demountables. Picture: John Appleyard

Documents released to Labor under public information laws two years ago revealed almost one third of demountables across the state had been in place for more than a decade.

Mr Daley said the Government had failed to keep up with the growing student population by building permanent classrooms.

“Public school enrolments have surged, but the Liberals have closed 15 more schools than they’ve opened since 2011,” Mr Daley told The Sunday Telegraph.

“Demountables are only supposed to be used temporarily but the Liberals have been piling them into schools to try to manage severe overcrowding.

“They failed to build new bricks and mortar classrooms for eight long years. Now we have hundreds of schools that are overcapacity, with no room left for kids to play.”

Labor will fund the demountable program by diverting $500 million from the Government’s $2.2 billion Sydney stadium spend.

Public school student numbers rose to 791,000 in 2017 — the highest since the 1970s.

The increase, together with the popularity of individual schools, has been blamed for the reliance on the unpopular buildings with the Education Minister Rob Stokes conceding they were here to stay.

Across the State’s 2,208 public primary and high school, more than one in 10 classroom are demountables, with the vast majority in western Sydney.

But confronted with complaints from parents of students at Epping West Public School who were having to eat lunch at their desks due to a lack of playground space, the Government bowed to public pressure with a pledge to replace 30 demountables with permanent classrooms.

Chantelle Sarkis with her children Jake and Lara outside Concord High School where there are nine demountable classrooms. Picture: Sam Ruttyn

Sydney mother Chantelle Sarkis, whose children Lara, Year 9, and Jak, Year 7, attend Concord High School, said its nine demountables not only looked “temporary”, but took up space.

“Both my children have had classes in the demountables, which have been there as long as I can remember,” she said.

“I just think they could free up so much more space if they had a permanent building.

Epping West is one of the biggest public schools in the State, with 1220 students.

Government figures show there are 4,640 demountables across the State, with 636 at schools at, or above, 100 per cent student capacity.

Parents have been campaigning for permananet classrooms at The Ponds High School in Sydney’s north west.

In Sydney’s north west, rows of demountables line the grounds of The Ponds High School where parents have been campaigning for permanent classrooms.

The school’s P & C president Roland de Pree said the number of students had grown to 1400, around 300 students above capacity.

“Our kids are told not to run in the playground because it’s so crowded with demountables,” he said.

“They need space to play and be kids.

Other schools teeming with temporary buildings include Alexandra Park Community School, which has 45, followed by Carlingford West Public School and Girraween Public School, each with more than 30.

The NSW Teachers Federation has long campaigned against the over-reliance on demountables, stating the buildings should only be used where there had been a shift in enrolments.

It argued private schools did not rely on demountables to accommodate students, and nor should public schools.