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

I can hear some of the opposition starting to call out about the Building the Education Revolution. The member for Sturt has 123 projects in his own electorate. The fact is that, when the opposition went to the election in 2007, they were pledging to cut money from the education budget. They wanted to cut some $3.2 billion and that included some $425 million from the smarter schools Improving Teacher Quality program. So I was interested to read the first speech by the member for Aston. On 26 October, he said:

I am proud to have helped establish the Teach for Australia initiative that aims to lift the standing of teaching through tapping into a different pool of graduates. I am pleased there is bipartisan support for it.

I welcome the member for Aston’s contribution and his participation in Teach for Australia, but I regret to tell him that his shadow education minister and the opposition leader were pledging to cut the very program which he thinks there is bipartisan support for. We understand the need for investing in education on this side of the House. We will continue to deliver the resources to make sure that every student in Australia, regardless of where they live, regardless of their background, gets a great education for their future.

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