Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. I refer him to the $1.2 billion blow-out in computers in schools, which has failed to deliver on a promise of a computer for every student; the $1.7 billion blow-out in the Building the Education Revolution; and the failure to deliver a trades training centre at every secondary school as promised before the last election. Prime Minister, when will the so-called ‘education revolution’ actually deliver improved educational standards for Australian students, or is Labor’s education revolution really just another product from Labor’s school of spin?

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank very much the member for Sturt for his question. The first thing I would say in response to the member for Sturt is to have a clear and close look at the Australian Education Agreement, which was signed between the Australian government and the states last year. I would say to the member for Sturt, who is not interested in any answer to the question he has just asked, that the Australian Education Agreement for schools represents a 50 per cent increase in Australian government investment in schools over the five-year period against the benchmark which we inherited from the previous government. That is the first point. The second is that, if the member for Sturt is actually interested in what we mean by quality education and quality education outcomes, he should study carefully the number of national partnership agreements which flow off that national education agreement and what therefore flows through in terms of the measurement of school performance. That is the second point. I could say to the honourable member that, if he is actually interested in real performance in schools, that is where his attention should go.

On the question of quality education, one of the key elements of policy on quality education is this: the public production of reporting of school performance. That is a core part of education reform. But which party in Australia stands opposed to the production of that public reporting of data on school performance? Could it be the Australian Labor Party? No. Could it be even the National Party? No. It is not the Democrats, because they are not around anymore. Could it be the Greens? No, it is not them but I think they were party to it. The principal agent is the Liberal Party in the state of New South Wales. The Liberal Party, under Mr O’Farrell, in the New South Wales parliament has blocked the core element of education reform when it comes to public reporting.

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Pyne interjecting

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

He interjects and says, ‘This is not a core element of reform.’ He says that the public reporting of school performances is not a core element of reform. We have engineered this agreement with the states and territories. We have increased the investment in schools. We have said in response to that that we want to see public reporting of school performance. Other states around the country are implementing these reforms, except New South Wales—and the reason for that is the rank opportunism of the Liberal Party of New South Wales. They have teamed up with—wait for it—the Greens. They have teamed up with the Greens in order to block this key education reform in New South Wales. He asked the questions: where is our reform agenda? Where is the implementation of the reforms? I would suggest that the member for Sturt hops on the telephone, rings Barry O’Farrell and tries to unstitch this piece of absolute policy obstructionism being engineered by the Liberal Party of New South Wales.

Finally, why is it they have suddenly dropped off their questions about Building the Education Revolution?

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We haven’t.

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Oh, he asked one yesterday. When it comes to the construction program underway in schools, we had one about a school yesterday. But, basically, it has been about a month since we had anything on this. For the benefit of the House, through the Building the Education Revolution component of the government’s nation building for recovery plan, 24,382 individual projects have been approved around schools across Australia. That is 9,526 schools across Australia—government and non-government—and in every state of the country. More than 20,000 of these projects are underway and 1,200 of these projects have been completed. What we experience as local members of parliament as we go to our local school communities is the absolute delight from local communities about having a library being built, having a multipurpose hall being built, having plans now in place for a new science centre being built and having plans in place for a new language centre being built. This is part of the bricks and mortar of Building the Education Revolution as well. He asks where the action lies. I would point him to the 20,000 projects currently underway across the country. Can I suggest that he simply gets real with his questions for the future.