Earlier this month The Sydney Morning Herald published an article headed "The number of school students forecast to come to every suburb in New South Wales". The article listed school-age population projections from 2021 to 2031 and 2031 to 2041. It will come as no surprise to anyone who has had the misfortune to listen to me in this Chamber before that one of the areas highlighted in the article is my electorate of Leppington. The two areas with the highest adjacent growth in population of school‑age children are in fact Austral and Leppington in my electorate. Between 2021 and 2031, it is expected that there will be 5,388 school-age children, which is an increase of 3,000 primary school children and 2,200 high school children. Just over the road in Leppington-Catherine Field there is a similar number of 5,346, comprising 3,200 primary school children and 2,000 high school children.
The previous Government used population projections that were simply flawed, which the department admits in the article. After digging into the projections and speaking to people in planning and education, it essentially used an assumption that developers would use the medium lot size. Developers want to develop areas and do it for profit, and the assumption was that they would just pick the lot size in the middle. Shockingly, they actually used the minimum lot size so they could fit in the largest number of houses and make the most amount of money. That means the projections were woefully undercooked, and we now have a situation in my electorate and throughout a lot of growth areas where schools are at capacity, and we are having to send students and families a lot further away than we otherwise would have.
It gets worse. During the previous 12 years of neglect by the Liberal-Nationals Government not only did poor projections come through the system, but also it failed to build any schools. I have said multiple times that across Austral, Leppington and Denham Court there is not a single public high school. There were announcements and re-announcements and re-re-announcements about building another public high school in Leppington, but it never came to fruition. Further to that, not only did the previous Government not build the schools but also it relinquished at least two sites in Austral that were earmarked for schools. That is an utter disgrace, and I will remind Opposition members of it at every opportunity. Not only was the Government not building schools; it was getting rid of sites. It was a complete furphy to say that they were not needed because both sites were purchased by private schools, which shows that the schools were needed but those opposite do not believe in public education so let the private sector pick up the slack.
The good news is the Minns Labor Government was elected in March 2023, and in two short years it has done everything to turn that around. The Government has announced a new high school for Leppington. The site has been chosen and it is adjacent to the existing primary school. On top of that, the primary school is getting a $90 million investment to ensure that it grows with the growing community. Just up the road, Austral Public School—which is also growing—is getting $90 million as well. On top of that, both schools are getting public preschools. That is fantastic news. It is especially exciting for the people of Leppington because it means that people travelling to Leppington station can drop off their kids across the road at the same spot, whether they are preschool, primary school or high school age.
More exciting news is imminent. If it has not already done so, the department is going to release the designs for the school. I encourage the community to have their say. It is their school, and it will be a focal point of not just the entire Leppington suburb but specifically the Leppington town centre. That shows the Minns Labor Government is committed to rebuilding public education in this State—and so am I, a proud product of public education.
