Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

The shadow minister just called out: ‘But you’re giving them the money!’ That is what he misunderstands. When I say ‘managed through school authorities’, I mean we worked with school authorities to consult with school communities and feed in project details. That is why it was appropriate to make an assumption about take-up—how many schools would choose to participate through their education authorities.

When we come back to the basics, working with people of goodwill, Catholic education offices around the country support the program and their schools support the program. When we work with the independent school system, they support the program and their schools support the program. When we work with state and territory governments, and they work with state schools, they support the program—including the Liberal government of Western Australia—and their schools support the program. At the end of the day, the shadow minister can come into this House and ask the kinds of questions he is asking, but he knows, and the members of the Liberal Party who talk to us and go to their local schools know, that this is being grabbed by schools with both hands as a great opportunity to modernise school facilities and support jobs in the local community. This is part of the nation’s response to the global recession: supporting jobs today. It is the biggest school modernisation program in the nation’s history. It is part of modernising schools for this nation’s future.

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