FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
11 September 2026
Back to Basics Before Another Generation Goes Backwards: Shelton
Family First National Director and NSW Legislative Council candidate Lyle Shelton says the lowest maths and reading results on record for NSW teenagers are the wake-up call the education bureaucracy has been too busy to hear, and is calling for a curriculum stripped back to reading, writing, arithmetic and the history of this country.
The Daily Telegraph reported earlier this week that NSW 15-year-olds are more than two years behind their parents’ generation in maths and reading. Just half met the national maths standard last year, down from 63 per cent in 2009. In reading it was 56 per cent, down from 66 per cent.
“Half the teenagers in this state do not meet the maths standard, and reading is going the same way,” Mr Shelton said.
“This did not happen in one bad year. It has been falling since 2009, and every year of it is a cohort of children who do not get those years back.”
“New South Wales is third in the country. That tells you what the rest looks like.”
“This week I congratulated a principal who was driven out of a 34-year career for saying four-year-olds do not need sexual and gender concepts introduced to them at school,” Mr Shelton said.
“The department found a process for her. It called her into head office, put her under supervision and directed her to celebrate the day. Who has been called into head office over this?”
The same assessment measured the classroom as well as the result. ACER research director Dr Jonas Bertling said classroom discipline “should definitely be a concern” and warrants a deeper look, because what happens in a classroom bears on how much time goes to teaching rather than to discipline. Only nine of the 91 countries tested reported less bullying than Australian students, and Australian students were more disruptive than the OECD average on every measure.
“You cannot teach a child to read in a room nobody can keep order in,” Mr Shelton said.
“And this is not the teachers. Eight in ten students say they feel strongly supported by their teachers. Teachers are doing the job. The question is what the department keeps putting in front of them instead of it.”
“Where is Education Minister Prue Car on this?”
Family First is committed to reviewing the national curriculum to return to real knowledge of the basics, particularly reading, writing, arithmetic, history, thinking skills and logic; restoring the primacy of Western civilisation and the Australian achievement; protecting children from gender queer theory and harmful LGBTQA+ gender fluid ideology; and recognising parents as the primary educators of their children.
“Teach them to read, write and add up. Teach them the history of their own country. Leave the ideology at the school gate,” Mr Shelton said.
“Reading and arithmetic are not somebody’s politics. They are the whole point of the place. If I am elected to the NSW Parliament next March I will introduce legislation to get this ideology out of our schools.”
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