The Queensland Liberal-National government has ousted two union-linked board members from the state’s curriculum body and will replace them with conservative figures, including the founding chair of the rightwing lobby group Advance.
The Queensland Teachers’ Union president, Cresta Richardson, and the branch secretary of the Independent Education Union of Australia, Terry Burke, will both be removed from the Queensland Curriculum and Assessment Authority board, the education minister John-Paul Langbroek’s office confirmed on Thursday.
They will be replaced by Leesa Jeffcoat, a long-term former diocesan director of Catholic Education, and James Power, a Queensland businessman, hotelier and nephew of Power Brewing founder Bernie Power.
Jeffcoat has spent more than two decades in senior roles in the Queensland Catholic education system for the diocese of Rockhampton.
Power also has strong ties to the Catholic community, and has recently made a foray into establishing his own school, St John Henry Newman College, which has been described as “geared to the classical, western tradition” and will open in 2026.
He was also the inaugural chair and a founding backer in 2018 of the right-wing lobby group Advance. At the time of its launch, he was personally advocating against Brisbane’s Tattersall’s Club admitting women as members.
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Advance has since been engaged in an extended campaign against the 2050 net zero emissions targets, and recently backed hardline anti-immigration campaigns.
The Crisafulli government has also appointed the former principal and regional director of the education department Mark Campling to the role of chair of QCAA, after the sudden resignation in June of previous chair Carol Nicoll after 11 years on the board.
Richardson and Burke found out about their ousting and replacements from media reports on Thursday morning.
“I was a bit surprised to learn of my removal via the Australian,” Burke told Guardian Australia. “I always try to extend courtesy to people that I deal with and I’d like to think that I might similarly have received some in return.”
Richardson said: “Queenslanders expect board appointees in key positions to have experience, understanding and strong relationships in the education sector. I’ll let the community judge this decision, the qualifications of the new appointees, and the manner in which the process has been handled.”
The changes come amid a breakdown in enterprise bargaining negotiations between Queensland public school teachers and the Crisafulli government, with teachers in October voting overwhelmingly to reject the government’s final offer of an 8% pay rise over three years.
Enterprise bargaining negotiations, which began in February, are heading to arbitration at the Fair Work Commission. Union members have already undertaken industrial action this year and further strikes are expected.
The QCAA board cull also follows a high-profile bungle in which 140 students at nine schools spent their last weeks of year 12 preparing for a final exam on the wrong Caesar.
Langbroek, the education minister, described the changes at QCAA as a “fresh start”.
“The QCAA board needs a diverse skill-set that includes educational leadership, governance and strong communication skills, and that’s what our changes will deliver. This is about ensuring all Queensland students have access to a world-class education, no matter where they live,” he said in comments to the Australian newspaper.
Burke said he was “disappointed” at the suggestion that these were not qualities he brought to the role. “This is the job that, frankly, I do every day,” he said.
Burke said he had seen the role as one of service to the education sector and had “given it my best endeavours, in terms of expertise around government and communications and structures of operations in schools”.
He rejected the suggestion that the Caesar exam mix-up reflected badly on QCAA processes.
“They are very, very thorough about the way they approach anything. I think it’s a matter of inquiry as to what happened at the school level,” Burke said.
