Advocates for secular public education are stepping up the pressure on the West Australian government to put an end to the funding of religious chaplains in public schools after school communities made their voices clear on the issue.

Last weekend, delegates attending the annual conference of the peak body representing parents and carers of public school students, the Western Australian Council of State School Organisations (WACSSO), voted in support of every public school being able to directly employ secular wellbeing officers.

The Rationalist Society of Australia understands that there was strong support and no amendments to the motion presented to the conference.

The motion – as reported by the RSA last week – asked for WACSSO to advocate for every public school to have “state government employed and funded wellbeing positions that are permanent, secular, professional, with direct employment by schools”. The preamble to the motion argued that the outsourcing arrangements were “no longer fit for purpose”, with staff in these roles reporting low wages, unpaid holidays and insecure employment. 

The public school communities of Western Australia have been leading the push to end religious-based discrimination in the chaplaincy roles, funded by both the state government and the federal government under the National Student Wellbeing Program (NSWP). Where public schools seek to appoint chaplains, they have to use third-party providers – primarily Christian organisations such as YouthCare and Scripture Union – that require applicants to have religious credentials. 

In 2022, delegates at the WACSSO conference also unanimously supported a similar motion that called for WACSSO to advocate for “clinical student social and emotional wellbeing programs” that would employ qualified people with appropriate expertise, and would do so “without bias or discrimination”.

Secular advocacy group WA Public School Alliance is now urging the state’s education minister, Sabine Winton, to listen to parents and carers, and give all public schools the choice to directly hire student wellbeing officers.

The group has written to Minister Winton (pictured) this week following the result at the WACSSO conference.

The RSA understands that non-government schools in receipt of funding under the NSWP have the choice to directly hire secular student wellbeing officers, while public schools are forced to use third-party providers.

Allowing schools to directly employ wellbeing officers through the state’s Department of Education would mean the removal of religious-based criteria previously described by the state’s equal opportunity commissioner as constituting “prima-facie religious conviction discrimination” under state laws.

Earlier this year, the RSA reported that the Cook government had begun a trial allowing one public school (Anzac Terrace Primary School) the ability to directly employ a person for the role without having to source a chaplain or wellbeing officer via third-party labour hire firms.

However, the government has not yet provided information about whether the one-year pilot program would be expanded and whether the secular wellbeing officer would continue to be directly employed.

The RSA understands that South Australia, Victoria and Northern Territory provide flexibility for public schools, allowing them to use NSWP funds to either directly employ or outsource. As reported by the RSA in 2023, the Australian Capital Territory does not allow public schools to hire chaplains.

Follow our campaign on school chaplaincy.

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Si Gladman is Executive Director at the Rationalist Society of Australia. He also hosts ‘The Secular Agenda’ podcast.

Image: Sabine Winton MLA (Facebook)