ABC 702

SUBJECTS: School funding Adam Spencer: Christopher Pyne is the Federal Education Minister. He joins us now. Thanks for your time, Minister. Christopher Pyne: Good morning, Adam. Adam Spencer: The first time you've been a guest on this program since the election. Congratulations on your election a few months ago. Christopher Pyne: Thank you. Adam Spencer: This is a very complex area of policy and it's easy to get bogged down in details, which I'd rather not do. But can we confirm that you won't be proceeding with the reforms agreed to by Labor and the states? Christopher Pyne: We won't be able to fund the two-point-eight billion dollars that was originally planned by Labor because Bill Shorten removed one-point-two billion dollars on the funding envelope in the pre-election fiscal outlook. So Bill Shorten took that money out. He was going to rip it off Western Australia, New South Wales and the Northern Territory. But I can reveal today that we will find two-hundred-and-thirty million dollars to pay to Western Australia, Queensland and the Northern Territory for next year, for 2014, which is the money they would have got if they'd signed up to the agreement, so that students around Australia are treated fairly and equitably. Adam Spencer: I'm sure the Liberal Governments in Western Australia and Queensland will be very happy with that. What's going to happen in New South Wales? Christopher Pyne: Well, New South Wales will get the money that they would have expected to get in 2014 as well because we will keep the same funding envelope as Labor across the forward estimates, which means all of those signatory states like New South Wales will get exactly what they would have expected in 2014. Adam Spencer: Beyond 2014? Christopher Pyne: Beyond 2014 I need to sit down and work out a school funding formula that is fair and equitable to everyone. But no-one should assume that they would get less money, but we need a model that includes the whole country, not the way the - Bill Shorten left it - the Shorten shambles - with some states in, some states out, the Catholics having not signed up to it and some students in different states being treated differently. Adam Spencer: When you say that you need to sit down and arrange these things, why has there not been consultation so far? We had Adrian Piccoli on this show - the New South Wales Education Minister - saying the first time he had heard of any discontent on your part was through the media on Monday. Barry O'Farrell said this. [Excerpt from interview] Barry O'Farrell: In all my years in politics I've worked out that it's best to have respectful discussions and consultations in private, not through the media. This issue has been escalated because of the poor way in which it's been handled. [End of excerpt] Adam Spencer: That's the Liberal Premier of New South Wales, not happy with the lack of consultation that's happened so far on this massive policy issue. Christopher Pyne: Well, I wouldn't expect - well, I would say, I would expect New South Wales to fight for New South Wales, of course. But they have a six year agreement with the Federal Government which we made very clear before the election, since the election, ever since Labor announced that in February that we would not have a six year funding agreement. And Adrian and I have had many discussions, many discussions this year, and it's been perfectly clear that we would never fund year five and six of the agreement, and everyone knows that. Adam Spencer: When it comes to saying that your position was made clear the Prime Minister, as he now is - when he was Opposition leader - said this. [Excerpt from interview] Tony Abbott: Under the Coalition you'll get the funding, but you won't get the strings attached. So what I want to say today is that as far as school funding is concerned Kevin Rudd and I are on a unity ticket. There is no difference between Kevin Rudd and myself when it comes to school funding. [End of excerpt] Adam Spencer: So to quote, there is no difference between Kevin Rudd and myself when it comes to school funding, end quote. Christopher Pyne: Correct. Adam Spencer: That's... Christopher Pyne: And that's exactly still the case, Adam. We had a - we have a one-point-six billion dollar funding envelope. And Labor, led by Bill Shorten when he was Education Minister, had a one-point-six billion dollar funding envelope. So there is absolutely no difference between Labor and the Coalition on the school funding envelope. Adam Spencer: No, but you've just said that the very deal signed by the states with the Labor Government will not be honoured, certainly in years five and six, and that things have to be renegotiated. Christopher Pyne: Yes, but it's exactly what Labor announced in the pre-election fiscal outlook when Bill Shorten ripped one-point-two billion dollars out of the model. He took that money and made it a saving for the Labor Party. And no-one can get away from that fact. So our funding envelope is exactly the same as Labor's, which is one-point-six billion dollars. We also always said, as - and in that quote, which you've generously run on the radio - we said there'd be no strings attached. In other words, we would change the implementation of the model, but the funding envelope would be the same. And that remains exactly the case. Adam Spencer: Hypothetically, you can now go and renegotiate this with certain parties, skew the funding outcome so that more goes to, say, the private school and independent school sector, and say we've kept the total envelope. Christopher Pyne: Well, nobody should assume that. What we have to do is make... Adam Spencer: [Interrupts]. But hypothetically, if that was to happen, you'd be saying, so the Prime Minister didn't lie before the election when he said we have absolutely total agreement on this when, in fact, you are - you could change well within the envelope, in inverted commas, where the money goes. Christopher Pyne: Well, Adam, there's no point in speculating about hypotheticals. The Truth is we can't have a situation where a student in Western Australia, the Northern Territory or Queensland is treated as a second class student by the Federal Government and the other states and territories. I'm the national Education Minister, not the New South Wales Education Minister. My job is to make sure that every student in Australia is treated the same way. Adam Spencer: But the concern is - and you would know this - that under your Government there's a concern that there will be more funding going to private schools, some of whom already have - you know, they're always talked about the four million dollar drama, theatres and the Olympic swimming pools and the rifle ranges - that there’ll be a skew of the money away from where it's needed, in schools that are really facing financial tough times. Christopher Pyne: Well, I think that is a great leap. Nobody is suggesting that money be removed from the public system to go to the private system. You're the first person that's ever suggested it to me. Adam Spencer: Oh, possibly directly to you in a radio interview, but you know that is a concern, that in the past, under Coalition governments, there's been a skewing of funding to schools that already have, in some cases it seems, more money than they know what to do with. Christopher Pyne: No, that's completely false, Adam. The Federal Government is the primary funder of non-Government schools. The state governments are the primary funder of state schools, amazingly, because state governments own and operate state schools and the Federal Government doesn't run any schools. So let's not take the propaganda from the Teachers' Federation and present it as facts. Adam Spencer: But it was this State Government in New South Wales who signed a deal with the Labor Government that they thought was a deal, but they didn't hear until Monday, through the media, is no longer a deal. So you can understand their concerns. Christopher Pyne: I'm not going to get into a slanging match with New South Wales. Barry O'Farrell is a very good friend of mine and I've known him for well over twenty years in fact, when, in fact, he used to work for Tony Messner, probably close to thirty years. So I'm not going to get into a slanging match with my friends. The truth is nobody could be under any illusions that the Coalition's policy was never to fund year five and six of this agreement. And we always said that we'd return to the model and change its implementation because we didn't believe in the central command and control features from Canberra that Labor always believes in. Adam Spencer: Can we check one more aspect of the discussion that's happening at the moment, Minister? There is a quote from today's Sydney Morning Herald, columnist Mark Kenny, an offer by members of the Gonski panel to walk him through the detail before he begins the demolition job has been rebuffed. Have members of the Gonski panel offered to - you've described the arrangement as reached before this week as incomprehensible. Have members of the panel who put it together offered to walk you through the fine detail? Christopher Pyne: I have met with members of the Gonski panel over the last twelve months. Of course I have. I've been the Shadow Minister for Education for five years before I was the minister. I'm very, very familiar with the details of the Gonski report. And I'm very - always happy to talk to anybody from the Gonski panel, but it's time for action. It's time for getting on with it. The truth is that the Gonski report required one-hundred-and-fifteen billion dollars of new spending over the next twelve years if it was to be implemented. Labor wasn't even attempting to implement the Gonski report. There is no national school funding model under the Labor Party, as left to me in this Shorten shambles. There were nine hundred schools out of nine-thousand-six-hundred covered by what would be regarded as the purest form of the Gonski report. Every single state and territory have precisely their own model, so let's get away from this nonsense that there is a national model left in the Coalition by Bill Shorten. There wasn't. There was only a shambles. And it's my job to fix it up. And I'm up for the job of doing it, but I'm not going to pretend that Bill Shorten left us with a pristine model, because he never did. Adam Spencer: And can I ask you one final question in clarification, minister, because you know, in the political environment that we have, that over the last three years was fostered by both sides of politics, but particularly yours, by continually quoting Julia Gillard's comments there will be no carbon tax under a Government I lead. That was in every advertisement break, it seemed, for three years there. You know that people will play back this quote. [Excerpt from interview] Tony Abbott: As far as school funding is concerned Kevin Rudd and I are on a unity ticket. There is no difference between Kevin Rudd and myself when it comes to school funding. [End of excerpt] Adam Spencer: They'll say you've broken that promise. They'll say that was a lie. What do you say to people who say that? Christopher Pyne: Well, it remains entirely true. There is no difference between Labor and Liberal on the school funding envelope. That's what we were talking about, school funding. And that remains exactly the case. There is no broken promise of any kind. Adam Spencer: Thank you very much for your time, minister. Christopher Pyne: Thanks, Adam. Ends