Money meant for Australia’s schools is allegedly being diverted to burgeoning bureaucratic structures at the expense of needy students.
Despite a federal funding indexation boost, a sizable portion of funds meant for students is flowing elsewhere, with only a fraction of each dollar reaching students in some states.
Public school advocates argue that funds are increasingly redirected to expand non-teaching staff and administrative frameworks, leaving core educational needs unmet. In response, public education advocates are demanding transparency, urging governments to direct resources towards students and urgently address inequities they say is favouring wealthy private schools.
‘A national trend’
Based on data from ACARA and adjusted for rising costs, such as salaries and materials, Commonwealth and State Government per student funding for public schools increased by 15.3% from 2009 to 2022 - just 1.7% per year.
While this has meant a small increase in the number of staff and additional materials, staffing figures show the biggest increases have been in non-teaching staff in central/regional offices and in schools.
Pat Murphy, president of the Australian Government Primary Principals Association says it is unacceptable to have situations where some students are fully funded while others fall short.
Murphy pointed to large leadership Institutes, school supervision models, growing ethical standards departments and additional regions as just a few of the "big bureaucratic structures" benefitting at the expense of public education.
“Too often, additional money meant for schools is diverted to expand bureaucratic structures rather than reaching the students,” Murphy told The Educator.
“In recent time we have seen some state departments reduce their funding to schools from 92 cents per dollar ten years ago and now that figure is down to 87 cents.”
Despite claims of increased funding, many schools throughout the country have seen no increase in their school grants, Murphy said.
“The only rise has been in wages for teachers, principals, and support staff. Meanwhile, bureaucracies are benefiting from the funds meant for schools,” he said. “This is a trend we’re seeing nationally.”
‘A shameful inequity’
When asked about the impact of this issue in Queensland, the president of the state’s peak teachers, union said the primary challenge government schools are facing is the “shameful inequity” of national funding compared to private schools.
“Queensland state schools have been conditioned to accept far less federal funding for far too long, there is no reasonable defence or explanation of why more taxpayer funds go to private schools,” Leah Olsson, Acting President of the Queensland Teachers’ Union (QTU), told The Educator.
“The significant challenges we see in Queensland state schools, occupational violence and aggression, increased workload and complex students all contribute to our dire teacher shortage crisis.”
Olsson said proper funding will go a long way to helping address these core issues and improve conditions and resources in the state’s public schools.
“State schools are representative of the society we all want to live in, all Australian students are entitled to a fully funded public education system that provides opportunity to lift their lives and thrive, no matter their financial background.”
Murphy said the only school funding increase in Queensland has been in wages for teachers, principals, and support staff.
“Meanwhile, bureaucracies are benefiting from the funds meant for schools,” he said. “This is a trend we’re seeing nationally."
Non-teaching staff numbers soaring
Public education advocates, Save Our Schools (SOS), say Victoria’s schools have seen a massive expansion in education bureaucracy over the past decade that has far exceeded the growth in teachers and students in public schools.
“It has soaked up much of a very small funding increase for public schools,” SOS national convenor, Trevor Cobbold, said.
A paper by SOS published in November 2022 found that since 2009, the increase in non-teaching staff in Victoria’s public education system was double that of teachers and three times the increase in students, with non-teaching staff increasing by 60.4% between 2009 and 2021 compared to a 29.3% increase in teachers and an increase of 20.1% in students.
What’s more, the growth in non-teaching staff has occurred at all levels of the school system – central and regional offices and in schools. Notably, these increases occurred under both Liberal and Labor Governments, the SOS paper revealed.
“The central point in all of this is that public schools have only received a very small increase in funding per student, adjusted for inflation,” Cobbold told The Educator.
“Much of this has been eaten up by increasing staff in central office and non-teaching staff – mainly administrative and clerical – and these increases have far exceeded the increase in teacher numbers and student numbers.”
Former Templestowe College Principal, Peter Hutton, is one of few people to have been a Principal in both the Independent and State Education systems.
Hutton, who is now Principal at Global Village Learning in Gisborne, says bureaucratic processes are absorbing almost half of what students in his state are meant to be receiving.
“For a young person in Victoria, there is more than $20,000 allocated per senior student. By the time it reaches the school level they get about half that,” Hutton told The Educator. “This money seems to be absorbed by some bureaucratic process along the way.”
However, a Department of Education spokesperson said per student funding in Victoria only continues to grow.
“Since 2015, Victoria has increased its recurrent expenditure for government school students by more than any other state or territory, including by 6.6% per cent in the Victorian Budget 2024/25," the spokesperson told The Educator.
“We will continue to negotiate and advocate for the Commonwealth to increase its funding to 25 per cent of the SRS for Victorian government schools to ensure that Victorian government schools are fairly and fully funded.”
‘Loopholes are undermining the Gonski model’
Following the release of the Better and Fairer Schools Agreement (BFSA) in July 2024, the Australian Secondary Principals’ Association (ASPA) has been pushing the Senate to consider amendments to the Bill that include “strengthening the accountability, transparency and reporting measures to ensure states and territories are directing the money appropriately in support of students and schools.”
“One hundred per cent of the SRS for public schools should be the minimum; we are a wealthy country with a federal budget in surplus,” ASPA President, Andy Mison, told The Educator.
“We urge the Commonwealth, and the states and territories yet to sign up for the new agreement to return to the negotiating table and get it done for our kids.”
Mison said loopholes that allow capital depreciation deductions should be closed.
“This reduces funding and undermines the Gonski needs-based resourcing model,” he said. “We are frustrated that it will be 2029 before even WA, Tasmania and the NT will reach the nominal 100% SRS minimum.
Mison says a faster rollout is crucial.
“Delays mean schools miss out on crucial resources, and those students most in need right now remain under-served.”
What ASPA calls a "loophole",the Australian Education Union (AEU) calls "an accounting trick".
The AEU said the Federal Government's funding deal allows states to use this "trick" to write off 4% of their total SRS contribution for other non-school based costs never intended to be covered from the SRS.
“For example, some states use it to fund the cost of public and private school bus transport for students, and most states use it to cover the cost of teacher registration authorities that covers all sectors,” AEU federal president, Correna Haythorpe told The Educator.
“Yet, private schools are not subject to the same 4% depreciation tax as part of their funding agreements with the Commonwealth. This is a serious loophole that needs to be closed.”
NSW cutting red tape, but concerns remain
In NSW, the Government has been actively working to cut, rather than expand, bureaucracy.
In April, the state’s Education Minister Prue Car said previous funding models had led to the hire of new executives, rather than new teachers.
“That meant at the same time that we had a chronic teacher shortage, we were hiring thousands and thousands of new executives,” Car said.
In a bid to reduce red tape, the Department is currently reviewing changes to "consolidate expertise and reduce duplication" to deliver more "effective and efficient" support for schools where it is needed. The Department has also slashed spending on advertising and consultants and consolidated programs and teams.
However, NSW Secondary Principals’ Council President, Denise Lofts, said the 4% of the SRS that “appears to be lost in the accounting” remains a big concern as many schools across the state struggle with resourcing issues.
“That is technically part of the SRS – therefore reducing funding for NSW Public Schools,” Lofts told The Educator. “We must ensure the whole 100% SRS is provided to all NSW school students, without any loopholes of Depreciation.”
Lofts said that closing these funding gaps is essential to ensuring equity across the state’s school system, emphasising that the current funding disparities undermine public schools’ ability to deliver quality education to all students.
“This means 100% for all – not under 100% and not over 100%, although over 100 % applied to All Schools would be even better,” she said.
“However, this would in theory also refer to our publicly funded independent/catholic schools, who are currently funded in the most part over the 100% SRS. Furthermore, all schools receiving public money should be governed by the same guidelines and accountabilities.”
A spokesperson for the Department of Education said the NSW Government is delivering a record $12.1bn in funding directly to NSW public schools in 2025, an increase of $388m.
“In NSW we are ensuring more of our educational funding is going directly into schools, including by reducing spending on contractors and consultants," the spokesperson told The Educator.
New funding agreement will make sure funds ‘glow in the dark’
Federal Education Minister, Jason Clare, who has been advocating for funding transparency, agrees that education funding should be fully transparent, saying all funds should “glow in the dark” so that they directly reach the schools that need them.
To ensure this happens, Clare said the BFSA will create transparency and accountability of school funding arrangements and introduce an ‘annual Ministerial statement’ to Parliament on progress under agreements relating to school education reform.
“I want this money to glow in the dark,” Minister Clare told The Educator. “The last Agreement did nothing to drive accountability and transparency – this Agreement does.”