Mr BARTLETT (3:03 PM) —My question is addressed to the Minister for Education, Training and Youth Affairs. Would the minister inform the House of Commonwealth government support for capital development in public schools. Is the minister aware of any alternative approaches to schools funding, and what is his response to these?

Dr KEMP (Minister for Education, Training and Youth Affairs and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service) —I thank the honourable member for Macquarie for his question. I acknowledge the very great commitment he has to public education and to building up public education in his area. Despite the fact that the states have prime responsibility for running government schools, some states are simply not living up to their responsibilities. In particular, they are not funding adequately the capital of their public school systems.

I have informed the House in the past how the Howard government is pouring money into public education and, indeed, doing so at a far greater rate than any of the state governments. I remind the House that in the last budget the Commonwealth increased funding for government schools in New South Wales by 4.4 per cent compared to a miserly 1.9 per cent increase from the Carr government itself. But when you start to look at the capital account, you come to realise just how serious is the run-down occurring in New South Wales public education as a result of the failures of the Carr government. The extraordinary fact is that it appears that a majority of the money spent on capital development in government schools in New South Wales is Commonwealth funding.

In 1996-97, figures show that the Commonwealth provided 54 per cent of total expenditure on capital works in government schools and later figures show little change to this, perhaps with the Commonwealth commitment moving to just under half of the total. It is interesting that it is another Labor government that is also performing exceedingly badly in this area—the Tasmanian Labor government, where latest figures show an alarming deterioration in the state government commitment to the capital stock in public education in that state. In fact, Tasmania is moving rapidly toward 100 per cent reliance on Commonwealth capital funding. Compare that with the other states, where approximately 75 per cent of the investment in public schooling in all the other states comes from the state governments and from their budgets. But when you get these Labor governments in office, and given the fact that they desperately need money for all their little pet schemes, they have not got enough left to put it into public education. It is in those states that public education is being run down.

When the Labor Party was in Hobart, the Leader of the Opposition had the greatest opportunity imaginable to tell his state colleagues to lift their game in relation to public education. But of course he did not do this because he has absolutely no real interest in education. We recall that when he was minister he told his biographer, `I lost a lot of ambition and I stopped straining. I thought there was less capacity to achieve in that portfolio than'—

Mr Beazley —Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. My point of order goes to relevance. If it is relevant to continue with this sort of nonsense, surely it is relevant to point out that the Prime Minister refused—

Mr SPEAKER —The Leader of the Opposition will resume his seat. Has the minister concluded his answer?

Dr KEMP —Yes, Mr Speaker.