Bill Shorten (Maribyrnong, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. Since the Prime Minister crudely ruled out the proposal to teach primary school children coding in his last answer, how does he reconcile his remarks with the following quote by the Minister for Communications:

ICT skills such as coding should not be only subjects offered in years 10-12, that's too late. We have to get to students as young as five or six.

Who is right, Prime Minister? You or the bloke who wants your job?

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Prime Minister has the call and will ignore the last part of the question.

Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

He is trying too hard, this bloke. He is trying too hard. He really is a try-hard today. Let me put the Leader of the Opposition out of his misery by quoting from the government's industry, innovation and competitiveness paper, which states on page 51:

… the Government will provide a further $3.5 million to encourage the introduction of computer coding across different year levels in Australian schools.

We are doing it. This is a leader of the opposition who demands that the government does what it is already doing, because he just did not do his homework. When the Leader of the Opposition was at school, I thought homework was encouraged, but he seems to have forgotten. The one thing you have to do if you want to be a credible, alternative leader, is do your homework, and if you had done your homework you would find that the government had beaten you to it.