Sky News Showdown

SUBJECT: Education Funding; Labor Leadership E&OE................................ Peter Van Onselen: Shadow Education Minister Christopher Pyne. Mr Pyne welcome to the program. Hon Christopher Pyne MP: Good evening Peter. Van Onselen: Can I ask you straight off the bat, if the legislation for Gonski is passed, will you reverse it? Pyne: Well the first thing is that this is not the Gonski report’s recommendations. The Gonski Report called for 6 and a half billion dollars of new spending, every year for the next 12 years. Now over the forward estimates that’s 26 billion dollars of new spending. Over the forward estimates, this Government is actually cutting spending on schools by 325 million dollars plus ignoring the 4.7 billion dollars of cuts to university’s vocational education and training and early childhood. But going to your question, would we repeal the Governments new school funding model? Well the truth is, unless they have a national agreement of an overwhelming majority of States and Territories, then there is no new school funding model. At the moment, they only have three jurisdictions…. Van Onselen: But they have said they will put the legislation in even if they only have those jurisdictions and in fairness, they also make up an overwhelming majority of the school aged population national wide because of having New South Wales, so if they do that, it will be legislated even if it’s not national. Would you repeal it? Pyne: Well we will certainly not honour any new school funding model unless there’s an overwhelming majority of jurisdictions that have signed up to it. And I’d have to correct you, New South Wales, South Australia and Australian Capital Territory does not make up an overwhelming majority of the population. It does certainly make up three jurisdictions out of eight but it’s not even close to being 50% of the country’s population of school students. But that is a new definition of what an overwhelming majority of jurisdictions is. The truth is, if there isn’t an overwhelming majority of states and territories and there isn’t a new school funding model and quite frankly, why would the Coalition honour an agreement that meets less than 50% of the current states and territories and also is a cut to schools. If the Coalition’s elected we will continue the current funding model for two years, including National partnerships and targeted programs; and ironically, over the next four years that means we’re going to spend more on schools than the Labor Party. Van Onselen: But in over-all terms, somewhere like New South Wales for example gets an extra five billion dollars from signing up to these school reforms. Now if you are not going to honour the legislation then they will by definition get five billion dollars less won’t they? Pyne: Well, Peter you’ve got to suspend everything you know about this Government to believe that in the 5th and 6th years, if they are re-elected three times, they will suddenly deliver rivers of gold from the money tree in the backyard… Van Onselen: But Mr Pyne, that’s the benefit of you winning the next election, is that presumably you can count on yourselves to be capable of delivering this legislation unless you repeal it. So we don’t need to worry about the failures of this Government’s ability to implement things because it will be your good self doing the implementing as the eduction minister as long as your don’t repeal the legislation? Pyne: But my point is Peter that you can’t count money promised on 5th and 6th years of a non-existent budget. Now the only thing you can count is the forward estimates in the budget and that is a 325 million dollar cut to schools. These rivers of gold flow from the 5th and 6th year in 2018 and 2019, which nobody can rely on. But when you ask the minister for schools how much money schools will get next year, he can’t tell people. So principals, governing councils, parents are completely in the dark about how much money they will get next year, let alone in 2018 and 2019. That’s why they can’t plan. Van Onselen: Can I ask you about some of the particulars within the package that’s there? What is it about those particulars that the Coalition opposes? I’m thinking about the fact that there is more autonomy in it for principals; there is also opportunities for development of teachers and greater levels of parental engagement with schools. That’s all part of the package that the Government is putting forward. Are those things that the Coalition opposes? Pyne: There’s a couple of things that we oppose. We oppose the new national school performance institute. The Government is establishing yet another Canberra based bureaucracy to oversight schools. None of which they run of course, they are all run by the states and territories. So that’s more Canberra bureaucrats, more tax payer’s dollars. We oppose all the new accountability provisions because it’s more red tape, more regulation. I mean I want principals and I want teachers to have more time teaching their students, teaching them the basics and the subjects they want to teach and principals framing their schools then they do filling out forms. At the moment, one of the chief criticisms that I get when I travel around the country is that people are sick of the over-burdened regulation that this Government is imposing and they want to put more regulation on schools. The Coalition trusts principals, this Government assumes that all principals want to do the wrong thing, we don’t believe that. Van Onselen: So when will we see an alternative package on education policy from the Opposition going into the election because the Government because the government has been trying to make some political headway on this issue by arguing this is the first time in a long time that an Opposition hasn’t provided a comprehensive alternative education policy. Pyne: Well, to be polite Peter, that is complete bunkum. We have an alternative. It is the current funding model which is needs based; which is based on the objective data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics and which rewards private investment … Van Onselen: So you don’t think the current system is broken … Pyne: We will keep the current funding system for two years while we sort out the chaos that Labor is creating around school funding. That means schools will get their current quantum plus indexation under the current method of indexing which is called the AGSRC; they can rely on their national partnership’s funding for programmes for disadvantaged students and the targeted programmes for non-government schools for disadvantaged students. We will have a relentless focus on the things that everyone in education identifies as the most important subjects. Teacher quality, parental engagement, principal autonomy and a robust curriculum. Now, we can talk about funding until the cows come home; the truth is in the last ten years we’ve spent forty per cent more on education in schools and in those ten years our outcomes have declined. Van Onselen: But we all know that when you say that Mr Pyne, we all know when you say that it’s the debacle that was the building the education revolution or the school halls around the place. This is actual policy that has reform wrapped into it whereas that was an attempt to throw money out the door during the GFC. Pyne: If the money, if money is the solution to every problem Peter, then we have put a lot of money into schools over the last ten years, the last twenty years, the last thirty years and our outcomes have declined. The reason they’ve declined is because we don’t have a focus on teacher quality; on the professional development of current teachers and on the training of new teachers. We’ve allowed the education unions and the departments of education to centrally control our schools rather than giving principals and their governing councils more power. We’ve allowed the curriculum to become fluffy and nebulous and child centre based rather than teaching traditional teaching methods and we haven’t engaged parents. We’ve in fact, pushed parents away in government schools the more autonomy we give principals the more parents will be engaged in their schools. That’s what’s happening in Perth, that’s what’s happening in Western Australia. It’s the only jurisdiction since 1977 where there is a drift back from non-government to government schools because of the implementation of independent public schools. Van Onselen: But can I take you back to the funding model that you say that you’ll keep for at least two years while you do a review of it. Doing so is not something, that for example the conservative Education Minister in the State of New South Wales Adrian Piccoli thinks is a good idea. He told me on my Friday show on Sky News that the system is fundamentally broken and needs to be changed. Presumably you think he’s fundamentally wrong when he says that? Pyne: Well, New South Wales has to make its own decisions Peter and the truth is that New South Wales has underpaid their schools; they’ve underfunded their schools for eighteen years for eighteen years, sixteen years of them Labor Governments and the last two years while the O’Farrell Government has manfully attempted to get the Budget under control in New South Wales after the profligacy of the Carr Government. They have underfunded their schools worse than any other state so it doesn’t surprise me that they are Van Onselen: So has Adrian Piccoli done a bad job then, in your view, in the last two years that he’s been the Minister? Pyne: Well, he’s had all sorts of challenges following sixteen years of Labor under funding New South Wales schools and he’s done his best in the last two years and I welcome the fact that New South Wales has announced $1.7 billion dollars of new funding in their schools because that will support New south Wales, and that’s what State Governments should do. Van Onselen: He announced that because they can connect it with Gonski Mr Pyne, that’s the reason that they’ve done that hard yards on that funding is because they want to marry it up with what they get from the Federal Government under the arrangements that they’ve got a binding contract that they’ve signed on to, yet there’s no guarantee that you’ll retain that. Pyne: Well, I simply point out that Tasmania under Lara Giddings has said that they will not be signing the new school funding model. They are a Labor State and they’ve said that because they don’t want the Federal Government to interfere in their State schools and you can understand that because state… Van Onselen: But that’s because they’re worried you’re going to get elected … Pyne: Well it’s a very big vote of no confidence in Julia Gillard from Lara Giddings that she said on Friday that she said she wasn’t going to sign up because she didn’t want Christopher Pyne myself, intervening in her schools but it’s a very good point. This new funding model gives the Federal Minister for schools unprecedented power in schools, none of which they run, none of which they control they’re run by State Governments. They employ the teachers, they own the buildings and why should the Federal Minister have unprecedented power in state run schools. Van Onselen: Mr Pyne we better move on to another subject before you start referring to yourself in the third person again. Pyne: I was quoting Lara Giddings. I don’t want to be like the Seinfeld program. That wonderful show. Van Onselen: Let’s move onto the issue of local government. Now I want to know whether you agree with Tony Abbott’s decision to call for equal funding for the ‘yes’ and the ‘no’ referendum campaign? Pyne: Well of course I do. I mean it is an absolute outrage that the Labor Party is funding the ‘yes’ campaign and not funding the ‘no’ campaign. The reason why the Coalition allowed certain Members in both Houses to cross the floor and vote against this referendum is so that there would be a ‘no’ case because the public have a right to have a ‘yes’ case and a ‘no’ case at a referendum and the Government should be funding both equally. Van Onselen: I was led to believe that behind closed doors that you were part of a cohort of Liberals that were arguing not to rock the boat on this one. Is that not true? Pyne: That is not true. Well I don’t know behind which particular closed doors you’re talking about? Van Onselen: In terms of the strategy that the Coalition was going to look to adopt on this issue, of whether or not it just waves through the Government’s position on the referendum or whether it fights for equal funding. Now in the end obviously you’ve settled on fighting for equal funding. Tony Abbott has written that demand or that request to the Prime Minister. But you are entirely on board with that and always were? Pyne: Absolutely. In fact I strongly believe that while in principle we support a ‘yes’ vote at this referendum it is up to the Labor Party to carry this referendum. We’re not going to be distracted from our task Peter which is to get rid of a bad Government , a dysfunctional Government, a Government that is not focused on job security, cost of living, border protection and economic management. The Government hasn’t lay the groundwork for this referendum, my advice to the Australian Local Government Association would be to ask the Government to pull this referendum because we are 88 days from the date of voting, the Government has made no case for change, they’re not investing in any change and they have led the ALGA down a garden path. If this is defeated again it would be the third time Peter and no government will touch it again. Van Onselen: Well why are you supporting it though this time? It has been defeated twice before and as I understand it your own base is pretty against a ‘yes’ vote in this referendum and indeed I think that the Liberal Party’s Federal Council actually the last time it voted on this was opposed to it. Pyne: Well no that is not factually true. The Federal Council voted in favour of it but Western Australia voted against it in that case. But as much as I love Western Australia they are not the whole division of the Liberal Party. The truth is we have a party position which is that in principle we support a referendum, we’re agnostic on voting ‘yes’ and ‘no’. Some of our divisions will vote ‘no’ because they have very strong views on it but my point is that Labor has not laid the groundwork for a ‘yes’ vote on this referendum and if ALGA allow it to go ahead and it loses, ALGA will not get the chance again for a very long time, if at all. The best advice I could give Australian Local Government Association is to ask the Prime Minister to withdraw this referendum because I can tell you it will get caught up in the unpopularity of this Government. People who want to vote out the government will probably vote ‘no’ and an opportunity to change the Constitution will be lost because of the incompetence of the Gillard Government. Van Onselen: Just one final question before we let you go Mr Pyne, on the issue of the Labor Party leadership, Kevin Rudd versus Julia Gillard. I heard your quote about the haunted house, it was a good one, it got run everywhere. But let’s be honest , at the end of the day, you would much rather face off against Julia Gillard than Kevin Rudd wouldn’t you? Because you would beat her by a more significant margin in terms of pure electoral politics than you would Kevin Rudd. Pyne: Look Peter, I have been in Parliament for twenty years and I’ve heard more rumours swirling around this place in the last 24 hours than I think I have heard in total for the last nineteen and something years before this year. The truth is nobody knows in this building what is going to happen. I think Kevin Rudd is delighted that he is the centre of attention again. The problem is that while the Labor Party is internally focused, tearing itself apart, they’re not focusing on the Australian people and their interests. We need an adult government and that is what an Abbott government will give Australia and at the moment the Labor Party needs time out in Opposition to sort themselves out. They shouldn’t be doing it on the Australian people’s time. Van Onselen: Are you sure that there has been more rumours in the last year than in the previous nineteen? The Costello forces were pretty good at rumour-mongering about John Howard. Not your good self of course because you were part of Mr Howard’s frontbench team but there was a fair bit of rumour-mongering then. Pyne: Well it might have been a slight exaggeration, Peter. The point is I’m trying to make is that in the last couple of days this place has been ablaze with talk about who the Labor Party will select as their Leader. I heard a rumour tonight that Simon Crean was going to nominate tomorrow. I heard another one that Rudd would move on Monday, another one that Rudd would move on Wednesday next week and Thursday next week. For goodness sake it’s time to have an election to get an adult government to give the Labor Party time out in Opposition which they need and end this circus that passes for a Government in Canberra. Van Onselen: Alright well we have got Nick Champion on next so you can bet we will ask him about the leadership merry-go-round. Pyne: Well he’ll agree with me. I am sure he will agree with me. Van Onselen: Thanks very much for joining us on the program. As always, great to have you on board. Thank you. ENDS.