Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Women's Issues) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Dobell for his question and acknowledge his keen interest in education in his electorate. The Australian government’s $1 billion Investing in Our Schools program is designed to provide funding for smaller scale projects for necessary infrastructure for schools. This program has become necessary because of the chronic neglect by state Labor governments of state government schools.

There are state government schools that have been waiting years for some of the most basic amenities to be funded. To put it in context, there are about 6,900 state government schools across Australia. Just in the first two rounds—rounds 1 and 2—of the Investing in Our Schools program there have been over 8,000 applications for funding from the federal government for state government schools. In round 3 there are now 10,000 applications from state government schools to the federal government. That is almost three applications per government school—per state government school—to the Australian government.

The sorts of projects for which they are seeking funding are things like fixing up vermin infested sports sheds, fixing up threadbare carpets and fixing up canteens that have failed to meet state government health department standards, yet state governments are doing nothing to invest in their schools. You would have thought that perhaps the state Labor governments would be shamed into doing something about it but, according to the Sunday Telegraph of 9 July, the New South Wales state government will spend more money on buying new cars for public servants than on upgrading schools this financial year. You would think that members opposite would be slamming the state Labor governments for failing to properly invest in state government schools.

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