Rod Kemp (Victoria, Liberal Party, Minister for the Arts and Sport) Share this | Hansard source

Senator Conroy, you have kept fairly quiet in recent weeks, and that is very wise in light of some of the difficulties you have had. This is an important question and the sports community are very interested in the way this new money will be divided up. The additional funding will go to the Australian Sports Commission for a range of programs to support talent identification, coaching and sports science programs and to increase the capacity of the Australian Institute of Sport to develop new talent. The total allocation to the Australian Sports Commission in 2006-07 for high-performance sport is approximately $125 million.

If Australia is going to compete as well as we have in the past as we go on to Beijing and then to the Commonwealth Games in Delhi and then of course on to London, it is important that we develop talent and that we provide talent with the best possible support. I congratulate the government, and particularly the Minister for Finance and Administration, on the very strong support that he has given to our sporting system.