Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training) Share this | Hansard source

I have two other questions. The third is that recommendation 9 by the task force suggested:

If comprehensive historic benchmarking data about cost of school building construction had been available, it would have provided a valuable resource to assist in the assessment of value for money. The database, BER-CAM, being built by the Taskforce to provide data about the cost of BER projects should be housed long-term with an appropriate custodian (such as a university) to ensure that it is available to assist in future benchmarking. The Commonwealth should support and fund the implementation of this initiative.

The minister's department responded:

The government will commit up to $3 million to support the BER-CAM database at a university to be determined through an open tender process. Funding for this commitment will be fully absorbed by DEEWR, consistent with federal Labor's commitment to return the budget to surplus by 2013. We note that historic benchmarking is a complex exercise and would need to take into account regional variations, and DEEWR has commenced preparation of documentation for the open tender process to determine the custodian of the BER-CAM database. The handover will coincide with the termination of the task force in 2011.

My questions are, first, has $3 million been committed for the development of the BER-CAM database, or has more funding been allocated for this purpose? Second, has an open tender commenced? Third, how many tenders have been received to date? Fourth, when will the tender close? Fifth, when will the project commence? Sixth, when will the database be completed? Seventh, which authorities will have access to the database?

Because of the perfidy of the member for Reid in taking my time before, I will ask my next question, in case we run out of time. Recommendation 12 by the task force suggested:

The Taskforce was impressed by school master planning clarity at many non-government schools, which focused on educational outcomes and stood them in good stead to more rapidly commence BER projects. The Taskforce recommends that the government education authorities review their approach to school master planning and engagement of school communities in this process.

The minister's department responded:

The government will encourage this review of approaches through MCEECDYA and its national reform agenda for Empowering Local Schools and DEEWR, through the new unit, will develop a paper for the minister to take to MCEECDYA in the new year.

First, has the minister taken a paper to MCEECDYA? Second, what was the date this was raised? Third, did MCEECDYA agree to review their approach to school master planning and engagement of school communities? Fourth, what was agreed or decided? Finally, when will this occur?

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