MOORA RESIDENTIAL COLLEGE — CLOSURE
615. Hon MARTIN ALDRIDGE to the Minister
for Education and Training:
I refer to email
correspondence between the Department of Education and the minister's
office on 12 December 2017 under the subject ''Narrative'' and
specifically a paragraph titled ''Moora and Northam residential
facilities''.
(1)
Is the minister aware that the department's advice to her office is
that it would cost $2.5 million to address building noncompliance issues at
Moora Residential College, not $8.7 million as she claims?
(2) How did the
Department of Education arrive at the figure of $2.5 million?
(3)
Could the minister please table the report or assessment that the Department of
Education relied upon in providing that advice to her office?
(4)
Has the minister sought any recent advice from the Department of Education to
reconsider the planned closure of the college at year end?
Hon SUE ELLERY replied:
I thank the
honourable member for some notice of the question.
(1)–(3)
The $8.7 million is the figure announced by the former Liberal–National
government in its last few months in office. It refers to a major upgrade and
refurbishment project that would address the immediate compliance and longer
term requirements of the residential college it if it were to remain open. The
independent reports tabled previously show between $7.2 million and $11.2
million was required to keep the facility open beyond 2018. As context to the
announcement of the closure, the department provided an estimate to address
immediate compliance requirements if the college was to remain open in the
longer term. The figure of $2.5 million was an estimate based on preliminary
information regarding fire compliance—previously tabled—and
indicative costs to address other compliance and maintenance issues. A formal
report and detailed costing were not prepared and certainly not provided to me.
(4)
No.