Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Employment) Share this | Hansard source

Let us get one thing very clear: no threat was made. But what I would remind the honourable senator opposite of is his record and the Labor government's record. Indeed, Nobel laureate Professor Brian Schmidt said on ABC radio:

I think this is an incredibly important reform. The current university funding model is … broken.

He then went on to say:

This has been a bit of a train wreck for the last five years. In 2011, on the day I won the Nobel Prize, I brought this up as a challenge for the then Labor government that this was being done on a year-by-year basis, it was being done very poorly …

So that of which Senator Carr speaks is a Labor legacy. When we got into government, we found that there was no money left for research and science, or NCRIS, I should say. The money ran out as of 30 June 2015. And, as my good friend the Minister for Finance assisted me with yesterday, on page 88, if I recall, of budget paper—