Don Randall (Canning, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Education and Training. Will the minister update the House on the government's commitment to science and research? How is the government supporting these vital sectors and are there any alternative policies?

Christopher Pyne (Sturt, Liberal Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Canning for his question. I know that he is particularly interested in knowing that today we announced the 37 projects that will be funded this year under the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Scheme, the NCRIS. I also announced today that we will fund a round of Future Fellowships scholarships for the next 12 months. This government is funding the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Scheme. We are funding the Future Fellowships scholarships. These two programs were defunded by the previous government. They cut research and they cut scholarships to researchers. In fact, the previous government not only axed these two programs, they also—in 2011 and 2012—took away the discounts for maths and science students at university, costing maths and science students $1.35 billion. That was their record in research and science—cutting programs and making university more expensive for maths and science students, who had previously been given a discount.

The Labor Party's maths and science policy also extended to trying to axe the PrimaryConnections: Linking science with literacy program, which is a very good program, and the Science by Doing program. But—because of the pressure from the opposition of the time, led by the now Prime Minister—they did not get away with it. We saved it.

We are also making substantial changes in research and science at schools. We are linking the national curriculum reforms to primary schools giving a greater emphasis to science and maths. And, as part of our reforms for teacher training at uni, we are requiring universities to only graduate students for primary school teaching who have a maths or science specialty.

It does not surprise me at all, however, that the Leader of the Opposition has a collective amnesia about these subjects and that science and maths are not his strong suits. A little bird tells me he is going to talk about science and maths tonight. It will be important to remember his record in cuts, in hurting uni students and in hurting school students. I was very surprised to read the transcript of the Leader of the Opposition's speech to the Caucus today, when he said—rather profoundly, I might say: 'We know the future is happening right now.' This reminded me a bit of 'Everybody is somebody' from the Travelling Wilburys; I think the Leader of the Opposition thought Martin Luther King said that but it was, in fact, the Travelling Wilburys. Today it is 'We know the future is happening right now.' It is less of a zinger than a zingerang: it came back to hit him in the face.

The truth is: if the future is happening right now, it is the present, Bill. If it is happening right now, it is the present. There is the past, there is the present and there is the future. The future cannot be happening right now—it has to be the present. (Time expired)