Mr LEE (3:06 PM) —My question without notice is addressed to the Minister for Education, Training and Youth Affairs. Does the minister recall his claim yesterday that government schools get an estimated $238 million in this year's budget? Minister, is it correct that this figure includes $144 million because the government has finally abolished the enrolment benchmark adjustment, $34 million so that Labor's Jobs Pathways program is maintained at its current level, and $27 million which the minister claims for literacy but which the budget shows at zero cost? Minister, isn't it a fact that the genuine increases for public school funding amount to $33 million over four years, or $4 per child per year? Could the minister explain why his old school should get an extra $576 per student when public schools get only $4?

Dr KEMP (Minister for Education, Training and Youth Affairs and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service) —There is always such a long wait for questions from the member for Dobell that, when they finally arrive, it is a great disappointment because they always have such an insubstantial basis. I will just go through that question point by point—that is the easiest way. This government is of course investing massively in Australian schooling. Government schools in this budget for the coming year will receive some $669 million more than they received under Labor in Labor's last year of office. The member for Dobell did not get it quite right, but the new measures in the budget deliver to government schools some $238 million, which is 87 per cent of the total money flowing from the measures in the budget; 87 per cent flows to government schools.

Dr KEMP —He raises the enrolment benchmark adjustment. It is not true that the government has abolished the enrolment benchmark adjustment. Unlike the Labor Party, which intends to return that money largely to the New South Wales Treasury and to other state treasuries, we took the view that it was important that that money actually flowed to government schools. And that money will be invested in improving science programs, technology programs, mathematics programs and innovation in government schools. The Labor Party's policy of abolishing the EBA simply means that state treasuries will be able in the future, as they have in the past, to put savings they make from the drift to non-government schools back into the consolidated revenue of the state budget, without any guarantee whatsoever that that money will flow to government schools. The difference between us and the Labor Party on EBA policy is that we intend to make sure that that money gets into government schools, where it can improve facilities for government students.

The literacy money is simply embodied already in the forward estimates. That is why it appears as zero in the measures. There is nothing unusual about that; that is standard budgetary practice. The member for Dobell also refers to the government's funding system for non-government schools. That is a system which of course delivers funding on the basis of a needs index, which, in many ways, one has to say, is somewhat similar to the index that the Labor Party used to distribute funding under its disadvantaged schools policy; it accepted that an SES type index was an appropriate index of need. We have put into place that index which delivers the greatest funding per student for the neediest schools and delivers the least funding to schools serving the wealthiest community. For example, Shore Grammar in Sydney will receive by 2004 some $178 extra out of the billions of dollars that flow through this program to needy schools, and SCEGGS Redlands will get about $20 extra.

The irony of the policy of the Leader of the Opposition is that, when he takes funding away from his arbitrary hit list of schools—a very unjust and unfair grouping of schools based on a discredited index, the ERI—those schools that will lose least will be the schools serving the wealthiest communities. The schools from which the Leader of the Opposition will take most will be those schools that can least afford it—schools where both parents of students work, struggling to provide an education for their children. For example, the Warwick School on the Darling Downs will lose some $3,000 per student. It is a small community school. SCEGGS Redlands will lose $20 as a result of the Leader of the Opposition's policy, but a community school on the Darling Downs will lose $3,000.

The injustice of this policy shows the lazy attitude of the Leader of the Opposition to develop policies. He was not even interested to compile a list of the schools serving the wealthiest communities. From a list of some 67 schools serving the wealthiest communities in Australia, only 23 are on the Leader of the Opposition's list. The rest on the Leader of the Opposition's list do not even fall within that category, because he could not be bothered to do the work. He is too lazy to do the policy work, so he comes up with a morally bankrupt policy which is going to be very unjust and will take most money away from those parents who can least afford it and take least away from the wealthiest in the community. This government is determined to give fair funding and quality education to all Australians, and that is what our funding policies do. We totally reject the unfairnesses and injustices in the opposition's approach.