Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

He does not like the fact that Mr Orgill has found that the vast preponderance of principals and people involved in those school communities actually say that the BER funding is working well in their communities. He just does not like it. No matter how many times he comes into this place and talks about school hall rip-offs and the like, it simply does not accord with what the Auditor-General found and it does not accord with what Mr Brad Orgill found.

Primary Schools for the 21st Century, an element of the BER, continues to be highly scrutinised. We have mentioned the Australian National Audit Office. We have had the BER Implementation Taskforce and the Orgill report. We have had Senate inquiries and parliamentary committees in Victoria and in New South Wales, and the government has committed funding of $13.2 million for the BER Implementation Taskforce costs. The truth is that the coalition never supported the NBN, they never supported the BER funding and the member for Sturt has belled the cat. I do not know what his colleague the shadow minister for communications and broadband was doing here today with his bill on the NBN and I do not know what he was doing in the Main Committee with his private member’s motion, because the truth is they will never support the NBN just as they will never support BER funding. That is the reality. It does not matter what we say or do. It does not matter what the school communities say or do. It does not matter how many tradespeople will get jobs.

Whenever I have opened a BER project in my community, I have asked the project managers, the school principals and the builders what kind of employment people have—the jobs that were created and the jobs supported. Invariably, to a man and a woman, these people tell me about dozens of jobs. Like Mal Jacobson from Painter Dickson, whose firm was working on the Rosewood State Primary School—125 jobs, for instance. These have been real jobs created in South-East Queensland as a result of the BER.

Those opposite have moved this private member’s bill as a political stunt—that is all it is. They hate the BER; they have no commitment to schools. They would have ripped $2 billion out of education if they had had their way and their policies had been implemented. They would have got rid of the Computers in Schools program, the digital education revolution would have gone, and you would have had thousands of people out of work. The member for Sturt’s message in relation to all of this is: ‘Don’t worry that Treasury talked about the 200,000 jobs which were kept as a result of our nation-building stimulus program. Don’t worry about the fact that in the last 12 months 353,000 jobs have been created in the economy because of the work of the federal Labor government. Don’t worry about that at all.’ He does not really believe in education. He believes in political pointscoring. That is what his proposal for this judicial inquiry is all about.

The member for Sturt talked about that fact that we announced the formation of a task force. We did that on 12 April 2010 and we put someone of integrity and probity into that role—a businessman, well accepted, with no obvious ties. I am not aware that Mr Orgill is a card-carrying member of the Australian Labor Party. We funded the organisation and they looked into it. The opposition mentioned 33 per cent. They claim that somehow $6 billion to $8 billion has been wasted under the BER. That is what it amounts to. How can that possibly be the case? It is not true. He alleges that this is mainly in the public sector. Where is there a skerrick, a scintilla of evidence? There is none.

The BER program was the largest part of our Nation Building Economic Stimulus Plan. It was critical for our economy and critical for our communities. It was critical for hundreds of businesses in South-East Queensland where my electorate is located—for local contractors, newsagents, corner stores and bakeries. All of them benefited. Where there was a school there was a BER project, and that is the truth.

Those opposite have no idea with respect to education. I went to Ipswich East State School for seven years. I am proud of the fact that I went to that state school. They are getting $3.2 million under the BER. For the first time they will have a decent hall—they have never had one. For the first time they will have a decent library—they have never had one. That is a real example of a school in a working class area in Ipswich in my electorate getting the kind of funding they need, so that kids in Ipswich will have the same rights as kids in the electorate of the member for Sturt. I want those kids to get the same advantage, and the BER is delivering it for them. It is nation building, creating jobs, supporting jobs in my electorate and giving kids every chance in state schools as well as in private schools. The BER deserves to be applauded and the coalition should hang their heads in shame for their opposition to it. (Time expired)

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