Kim Carr (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research) Share this | Hansard source

This is an irony. We had the previous government closing down this program and now we get asked by the current opposition: ‘What are we going to do about schools that are adversely affected by the previous government’s decision?’

I remind the Senate of a few basic facts in this regard. Initially, $700 million was provided to state government schools and $300 million was provided to non-government schools over the life of the program. The total amount of funding available to schools was increased by $181 million in 2007. These funds were targeted at schools that had received little or no funding. But, to give all state schools the opportunity to access the new funding, schools that had already received funding at or above $100,000 were not eligible. Furthermore, under the guidelines of the previous government, schools were required to give an appropriate recognition of assistance from the Australian government, which included the conducting of official—(Time expired)