The David Davies Memorial Lecture

December 7, 2011

Brisbane

Hon Christopher Pyne MP

Shadow Minister for Education, Apprenticeships and Training

Manager of Opposition Business in the House

“Excellence in Universities”

Salutations

Thank you for the opportunity to deliver the premier annual lecture on the Liberal National Party calendar in honour of David Davies, about whom my colleague George Brandis has just spoken with his customary eloquence. I am glad to associa...

Schools Minister, Peter Garrett is a lame duck with reports today that the Prime Minister called on him to resign and he refused to go and now she has confirmed her lack of confidence in him by handing his biggest responsibility to Brendan O’Connor, said Christopher Pyne, Shadow Minister for Education.

“Mr Garrett has embarrassingly been forced to job share his key responsibility of devising a new funding model for schools with another Minister, Brendan O’Conner - a clear indication...

“The school year has drawn to a close and the Government has gone quiet on the computers in schools programme, which was the centrepiece of Labor’s 2007 education policies,” said Christopher Pyne, Shadow Minister for Education.

“This is because the December 2011 deadline has arrived and the programme is hundreds of thousands of computers behind schedule,” Mr Pyne said. 

“In 2007 Kevin Rudd waved a laptop at a press conference announcing that the ‘toolbox of the 21

Labor is all talk and no action with the re-announcement of welfare quarantining of Aboriginal parents who don’t get their children to school, The Shadow Minister for Indigenous Affairs Senator Nigel Scullion said.

“We’ve heard this policy announced by the Federal Government several times but with no follow through action,” Senator Scullion said.

“This government can re-announce this policy until the cows come home but it is no good unless it is acted on and people are breac...

Key indicators from a Council of Australia Government Reform Council report suggests little student improvement and a significant fall in attendance rates in Australian schools, said Christopher Pyne, Shadow Minister for Education today.

“Australia has made no significant gains in lifting the number of students reaching the minimum benchmarks for literacy and numeracy since Labor was elected in 2008,” he said.

“With respect to improvement between 2008 and 2010 the report suggests that...