Can your child
swim 50m or float for two minutes?
According to a recent report from Royal Life Saving Australia these are
basic skills that more than 20% of school children are not being taught. RLSA Chief Executive Rob Bradley is calling
on all levels of governments to make swim programs mandatory in all Australian
Primary Schools and wants support for parents struggling with the cost of
lessons and “funds for urgently needed programs to target rural, indigenous and
multicultural communities”.
In-term swimming
classes are not compulsory here in WA according to the Department of Education
– so we are particularly fortunate to have a Primary School that needs no
government urging: it cares about the children, and with the present leadership
team they are in good hands. But the cost
to parents is significant, particularly if there’s more than one child. Sometimes families simply can’t afford
it. Travelling back and forth to Albany
is tiring for the younger children and the loss of classroom time children is irreplaceable.
The RLSA’s
National Drowning Report 2011/12 shows that last year there were 284 drowning
deaths in Australia: twenty one of these were children aged 0-4. These were
somebody’s kids.
This chart of
deaths by drowning suggests two trends. First,
there is a slight improvement in the young 0-14 age group – due perhaps to a growing parental awareness
coupled with increased efforts within some schools. Second, the figures for age groups over 15
are worse: with one exception, each age cohort shows an increase over the five-year
average. The message here is that we
would all be safer if we if we were better swimmers. We’d be healthier too.
The Australian
Water Safety Strategy aims to reduce death by drowning by 50% by the year 2020. Surely our own Community Strategic Plan
should contribute by including a year round heated aquatic facility in its
plans? Council has already agreed that
the need exists but I honestly can’t say whether the pool is in the mandatory
Community Strategic Plan (Bulletin #817)
- there’s no written version the plan available to councillors or the
community.
There is however
the embryo of a Corporate Business Plan that has been developing within the
Shire Administration for 18 months or so but has yet to emerge for Council
consideration. And I can tell you with
certainty that the pool is not included in this plan. If this disappoints you as much as it has
disappointed DACCI then you should let your councillors know at their next
meeting. I know it’ll be Melbourne cup day,
but the race will be over long before Public Question time that day. Has the pool missed the draw?
