George Brandis (Queensland, Liberal Party, Minister for the Arts and Sport) Share this | Hansard source

With respect, Senator Carr—through you, Mr Temporary Chairman—I think that you are drawing a distinction without a difference here. The expectation of the budget measure is as indicated, and that has not changed. What you were inquiring of in Senate estimates, if I understood you correctly when you read the extract from the Hansard, was whether something—that is, the provision only of fee-paying places, to the exclusion of Commonwealth supported places—was a theoretical possibility. It is not the intention or the expectation of the government that that would happen. That is, I imagine, why the minister has required that the funding agreements contain provisions for her approval and other safeguards to ensure, as I indicated before, that that does not happen.