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

My question is to the Minister for Education. I refer the minister to the Hastings Public School in New South Wales, which has now been told that their new school stimulus covered outdoor learning area will cost a whopping $954,000, including $346,000 on management fees, designs and related costs, when in June the same covered outdoor learning area was slated to cost $400,000—a blow-out of $554,000. How does the minister justify continuing to dismiss as isolated problems what is obviously a systemic failure to use taxpayers’ money wisely?

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

I thank the member for Sturt for his question. Earlier this week the member for Sturt and I spoke on the phone and he asked me in somewhat excited tones whether I had listened to him on Fran Kelly on Radio National that morning. I did have to inform him that I had not had the opportunity to listen to him and I was very sorry for that. It appears today that he has returned the compliment because if he had bothered to listen to Fran Kelly on Radio National this morning or at any point in the course of the morning read my transcript, he would have been aware of the circumstance of Hastings Public School. I will now just catch him up with the news cycle.

What is happening at Hastings Public School is that an audit is already in progress. The audit had commenced well before the question involving Hastings Public School was in the media at all. It was not associated with the opposition, the New South Wales Teachers Federation or any of the joint claims that they are raising in the public debate at the moment.

Well before this was in the media, the audit processes in New South Wales had identified Hastings Public School for an audit. Indeed, the audit processes in New South Wales have audited 102 schools, and they will continue to audit as necessary. This is obviously all big news to those opposite, but they really do need to catch up, because this was announced. The fact that there would be these audits to ensure robustness in the program was announced by the New South Wales government.

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Mackellar, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Seniors) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. It is on relevance. I did listen to the interview this morning, and nobody was impressed with the audit being the answer. She was asked to justify—

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The member for Mackellar will come to her point of order.

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Mackellar, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Seniors) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The point of order is that the question is: how do you justify a waste of half a million dollars, as distinct from saying, ‘I’m having an audit,’ even—

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The member for Mackellar will resume her seat. The Deputy Prime Minister is responding to the question.

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

There we go: the future of modern liberalism at it again.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Deputy Prime Minister will go to the question.

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

If she just tried to stay up with the information cycle, it would be of help to all of us. Obviously Building the Education Revolution is a huge program: 9,500 schools and around 24,000 projects. There have been audit arrangements built in through the program. Obviously there are checks that we run. There is the value for money in the guidelines. Then, of course, there are checks taken by block grant authorities. The question of having an audit squad and having these audits was announced by the New South Wales government in—wait for it—September last year. Following the announcement in September last year, do you know what happens when you announce an audit squad? Well, go figure: they go and they conduct audits. That is what they have been doing: auditing 102 schools. They had identified the Hastings Public School for an audit. That audit is taking place now, well before any of these matters were in the media, and it is a fabulous example of the system working exactly as it was designed to do.