Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

There are no plans for what the member suggested—no plans whatsoever. Our plans are for more freedom for our university sector. If the members opposite do not respect the minister or, indeed, me, they should at least respect Professor Brian Schmidt, Nobel laureate, who said this morning on ABC radio:

I think this is an incredibly important reform. The current university funding model is, in my opinion, not very good. I would say—

he went on—

it’s close to being broken.

This is Brian Schmidt, Nobel laureate, who says that the current model is broken—someone that members opposite were quoting yesterday. He says that the current model is close to being broken and he goes on:

It’s certainly not serving either the students or the universities very well.

We need to fix it—

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