Deborah O'Neill (Robertson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for School Education, Early Childhood and Youth. Why is the passage of the Australian Education Bill 2013 through the House today so important for building a stronger, fairer and smarter future for our nation?

Peter Garrett (Kingsford Smith, Australian Labor Party, Minister for School Education, Early Childhood and Youth) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to thank the member for Robertson for her question. She has been a strong advocate for education both in this parliament and in her electorate, with the delivery of over $77 million for some 97 projects—30 classrooms, eight multipurpose halls and five trade training centres—in the electorate of Robertson. She knows, as we all do on this side of the House, that this is a genuinely historic day in education in Australian history.

It is a day that has been a long time coming, and I want to while I am at the dispatch box place my appreciation for the efforts of all those people in both the government and non-government education sectors, including Mr Gonski and his panellists, who provided the clear thinking and the recommendations that this government could take and work with for a new, fairer funding model for school education for all schools around Australia.

That is why this reform is so substantial. Yes, there is additional investment that comes with this reform and we committed to it in the budget. But the key thing here is this: every dollar in education that any government spends under this framework in the legislation that passed through this House today is directed at the needs—the individual needs—of students in schools, government and non-government. That is a powerful, transforming reform and a great improvement to the way in which we find schools now and the way that the Leader of the Opposition is still committed to.

I do not have to go far afield to find support for this proposition. Only in the last day or so we had the Australian Industry Group standing up and saying quite clearly that the needs-based funding reform is an essential thing that we need to do—its principles are fundamentally sound. We had the education minister from New South Wales come down here and actively lobby his National Party counterparts on the other side of the House on that very measure as well.

For people in the bush this is such a strong driver of economic vitality and social vitality. The fact is that the loadings in this model recognise disadvantage wherever it occurs, whether it is in rural or regional Australia and whether it is in electorates that have a great deal of disadvantage. I know members on the Labor side of the House understand that only too well.

This is an important day and it is a day which vindicates the significant reforms and high levels of investment that have been the hallmark of this Labor government ever since we came to office. We are pioneering and pushing forward reform which is aimed at lifting educational performance in every school around the nation and lifting the nation as a whole. This legislation passed through the House. The only people who do not want better schools for Australia are the opposition. (Time expired)