The Tasmanian Greens today called on Liberal Leader Will Hodgman to sack Michael Ferguson from the Education portfolio, after exposing the latter’s deliberate and false school closure scare campaign.

Greens Member for Braddon, Paul ‘Basil’ O’Halloran MP said he had been contacted by a range of representatives of regional school communities, including King Island, outraged at the ‘cheap and unacceptable’ deceitful letters claiming their school was slated for closure.

“Mr Ferguson has been exposed for his deliberate lies to Tasmanian school communities, which by anyone’s measure is a grievous step too far,” Mr O’Halloran said.

“Let me state this one more time very clearly, the Greens did not force any schools to close, do not support any forced school closures now, and will not support the forced closure of any Tasmanian school after March 15.”

“It is scurrilous and contemptible to deliberately attempt to stir up fear and uncertainty in our school communities, based on blatant lies, to exploit for personal political gain as Mr Ferguson is now exposed as doing.”

“My office has heard from King Island, Flinders Island and the east coast by members of outraged school communities who cannot believe that the Liberals think they can be treated as fools and taken for a ride like this.”

“People remember it is the Liberals who have a history of forcing schools to close.”

“People remember it was in fact the Greens who have twice saved many schools from closure, when Labor Ministers also tried to close schools. Recently as Education Minister it was Greens Leader Nick McKim who halted exiting Minister Lin Thorpe’s forced closure model.”

“The Greens then put in place a community based task force to identify community expectations about school viability, and acted on that report’s recommendations.”

“If Will Hodgman is any Leader worth the name he must require Mr Ferguson to publicly apologise to all school communities who received his false scare-mongering, and sack him from this crucial portfolio.”

“Anyone wanting to represent the state’s educators must demonstrate leadership and integrity. By blatantly lying to benefit his own political career rules Mr Ferguson out of contention,” Mr O’Halloran said.

Download: example of the false scaremongering letters being distributed to school communities by Michael Ferguson MP, Feb 2014:

Mar1_Ferguson_on_closing_KI_school_mailout_P_OHalloran_ATTACH.doc
Greens Member for Braddon, Paul ‘Basil’ O’Halloran