Province right to probe public school spending

There’s something vaguely comical about the idea of our provincial government having the nerve to investigate any organization’s spending habits.

Given we’re on a collision course for a $12-billion deficit this current financial year (hey, Joe Ceci, how’s that $55-a-barrel forecast holding up?) it would seem the height of hypocrisy for Education Minister David Eggen to investigate how our city’s public school board spends its bucketfuls of taxpayer dough.

Yet, he’s doing the right thing. In fact, Eggen’s department is one of the few shining lights in a government that regularly bounces between well-meaning ineptitude and stubborn incompetence.

His move to incrementally axe the longstanding but odious practice of whacking all parents, no matter their income level, with exorbitant school fees, whether for basic supplies or transportation costs, is better late than never.

Of course, before having kids, school fees were up there with quantum physics in the “rarely give a single thought to” category. But when you become a parent of school-age kids the demands for cash for basic educational materials and to bus them comes as a September stunner.

It’s something I’ve never understood. When I went to school, in the poorest district of England, no parents paid for pencils, paper and textbooks. Nor did any family fork out for school buses.

It was free, paid for by the local council — usually working-class folk, retired miners and the like, who didn’t have much to spend, but what they had they spent on ensuring every kid got a truly free education. That way does our escape lie.

Granted it was a different time in a different place. But Alberta’s so much richer on every level and government spending so much greater that this makes no sense.

Here, in this land of full milk and sweet honey, our kids and their families are force-fed gruel, despite the huge budgets dropped into the laps of school boards.

Such imposed fees are blatantly unfair, especially to poorer parents, so kudos to Eggen for finally doing something about it after decades of governmental inaction.

If the New Democrats concentrated on such policies affecting ordinary Albertans instead of imposing carbon taxes, changing light bulbs and engaging in social-engineering experiments they might repay the faith many voters showed in them and stand more than a snowball’s chance in the next election.

Despite the Calgary Public School Board operating on more than $1.3 billion a year, after being told to reduce some busing fees, the board did its usual “sky is falling” routine for which they’ve achieved justifiable renown in the last quarter century.

Usually, the response from government is coughing up yet more funding, but this time — am I dreaming? — the minister essentially said, “OK, buddies, let’s take a look at how you spend all that cash you currently get.”

So the review will take a comprehensive look at the board’s financial records on spending, including the board system and administration, trustee spending, head-office staffing levels and facility costs.

Good, it’s about time. We need to ensure every penny spent on education is for the benefit of our children.

If, in the ultimate irony, the person who accomplishes this is from a political party that seems diametrically opposed to rocking the world of the entrenched public servant, then so be it.

The proof is in the pudding — what a glorious expression — so we shall see what transpires. But if Eggen follows through and succeeds in targeting spending to where it needs to be then he deserves respect and support.

Heck, then maybe make the lad health minister. Now there’s a challenge.

We need to ensure every penny spent on education is for the benefit of our children.