Perth
PM: I am delighted to be here in Western Australia.
I have just met with Premier Barnett and I have taken the opportunity to make a new offer about school funding for Western Australia to Premier Barnett.
I am working around the country to make sure that every school, all 9500 schools, have available to them the resources they need to teach the children in that school.
I am working to ensure that we fix the current broken school funding system and we get school resourcing right for generations and generations to come and of course this new money comes tied to new ways of working.
I want to make sure that these resources are available so that kids that need extra help to learn to read and write and do maths get that extra help.
That the kids who are racing away, who have done all of the school work and are at risk of getting bored get a personalised program that keeps extending them.
That schools have got the specialist teachers they need: the librarians, the music teachers, the language teachers.
That schools have got the equipment that they need in the twenty first century.
When we first announced our funding offer for Western Australia we said that to move schools in Western Australia up towards the school resource standard would mean in injection of $300 million into base funding in Western Australia plus Commonwealth indexation at 4.7 per cent and we said we would require state indexation of least 3 per cent.
That $300 million would be divided on a two for one basis between federal funds and state funds.
When we first put out that offer we had taken into account that costs are greater in Western Australia.
Because of the nature of the state, its vast size, but also the nature of its economy, schools cost more to run here.
Put simply of course, teachers can go and get other job opportunities that could potentially pay them more, so Western Australian teachers are paid better than teachers around the rest of the nation.
We had already taken that into account in the first offer and said that the cost base here was 8 per cent higher than other parts of the country.
We have done some more work, some more figure work, some more research and actually the cost differential is more like 11 per cent.
On the basis that we now better understand the increased costs of providing education in Western Australia I have today told Premier Barnett that we are prepared to increase the offer that we have put for Western Australia to sign onto these school reforms.
Our new offer would mean that the increase in base funding would be around $920 million and then of course with indexation that means that schools in Western Australia over 6 years would get an additional $2.8 billion of resources.
Divided, $2 for every $1 coming from the commonwealth to the state; so us paying 65%, the state paying 35%.
We have just put that offer to Premier Barnett, I have put it to him personally.
We will now have officials follow up with those discussions.
But I do want to see Western Australian schools benefiting from better funding arrangements and from our national plan for school improvement.
I do want to see every child in Western Australia going to a school that has the resources in it that are needed to get them a great education.
I do understand that Western Australia wants to be fairly treated in this reform agenda.
I want WA kids to get fair treatment too and the new funding offer that I have put on the table today, I believe, is a very persuasive one.
An extra $2.8 billion for kids' education here in Western Australia.
I am happy to take questions.
JOURNALIST: So is the stand-off over Gonski [inaudible]
PM: We have reworked the figures; this is not changing the model in any way.
The model is the same for all 9,500 schools around the country.
A school resource standard which is factored on how much it takes to teach a primary school kid, how much it takes to teach a high school kid, how much it takes to get them a great education.
Then with loadings that recognise that if kids come to school from poor homes, Indigenous children, children with disabilities, children from non-English speaking backgrounds - it takes more to teach them so there are loadings.
Then for small schools, and for remote and regional schools, there are additional costs.
So the model is the same but we always factored into the model the difference in the cost base here in WA.
We have done some work and as a result of that work I am in a position to announce the offer today.
JOURNALIST: Barry O'Farrell [inaudible]
PM: These factors about the cost base would have never applied to New South Wales.
They apply here in Western Australia because of the nature of the economy here and the fact that teachers are paid more here and as a result of course the costs of schooling are more here, because teacher salaries, the costs of staff are such a big proportion of whole school costs.
JOURNALIST: [inaudible]
PM: The cost base change is from 108 per cent to 111 per cent,
That does change the base funding from $300 million extra to $920 million extra.
Then there was always going to be the indexation, when you add in the indexation, that brings you up to the figure of $2.8 billion over six years.
JOURNALIST: Where has it come from?
PM: Well the maths is the same as it always has been.
We've always said that for the increase in the base funding we would put in $2 for every $1 that a state put in; when it came to indexation we would index our share at 4.7 per cent and we would ask states to at least have a 3 per cent indexation rate.
Where does it come from in terms of the Federal Budget? We made some savings and many of them were controversial.
But we made some savings to free up money to invest in schools not only now but in the long term and those ten year funding figures are available in the Budget.
JOURNALIST: Premier Barnett [inaudible].
PM: Well I spoke to Premier Barnett today and I think it's respectful for me to suggest that you should get his response directly from him.
JOURNALIST: [inaudible]
PM: Well when I saw Premier Barnett today I said I would provide full details of this offer.
I would certainly ask him to consider full details of this offer.
I do not understand why anyone would stand in the way of children in Western Australia getting a better education and children benefiting from $2.8 billion in new resources.
JOURNALIST: [inaudible]
PM: The characterisation in your question isn't right.
We had always factored in Western Australia that there was a difference in the cost base here.
So we had analysed the difference in the cost base and that gave us the 108 per cent figure, we've done some more work and determined that the difference in the cost base is 111 per cent.
Inevitably as you work through a big and complex reform like this you've got information to consider, facts to consider and when facts come to hand of course we take them into account.
You wouldn't want people doing anything else would you? Ignoring the facts? Surely not.
JOURNALIST: [inaudible]
PM: The figures that I have put forward today are a reflection that on having done more work we thought the cost base differential more accurately reflected higher costs in Western Australia at a 111 per cent.
That is what has driven the change today.
JOURNALIST: Prime Minister on another issue, you would have been briefed on a so-called Liberal Party function venue...
PM: Yes I have been.
JOURNALIST: [inaudible] about your body shape, what is your take on that? What is your response?
PM: Well I mean this is Tony Abbott's Liberals, this is what they're like and I think that the real risk for Australia is if Mr Abbott was ever Prime Minister it wouldn't be a question of what‘s on fundraising menus, we would see this lack of respect for women littered throughout all of his government policies and documents.
JOURNALIST: But they're not all like that, surely? Mr Abbott himself didn't [inaudible]
PM: Let's go through the pattern of behaviour here, Mr Abbott personally has gone and stood next to signs that describe me in a sexist way.
We've had the Young Liberals hosting a function where jokes were cracked about the death of my father and now we have Mr Brough and Mr Hockey at a function with this grossly sexist and offensive menu on display. Join the dots.
JOURNALIST: Do you think that - because Joe Hockey says he didn't see it - do you believe that he did not see it?
PM: Well, you know, you can talk to Mr Hockey about that...
JOURNALIST: He says, he tweeted, that he hadn't seen it, are you [inaudible] you don't believe that?
PM: I think that there is a great deal of convenience in that answer from Mr Hockey.
JOURNALIST: And the same for Mr Brough, it was his function no less...
PM: I think there is a great deal of convenience in that answer from Mr Brough.
JOURNALIST: Is there a pattern here? You say there is a pattern from the Liberal Party, can I ask was that, has that, has the Labor Party been sitting on that menu, that story about that menu?
PM: Absolutely not, no, and the first that...I'm aware that this is now circulating and isn't that interesting in and of itself that a grossly sexist and offensive Liberal party menu card comes out publicly and somehow the spin is immediately that this is all Labor's fault.
Well excuse me, the first I ever knew about this was when it started coming into public light though Twitter and I was briefed on it by my media staff because I knew you would ask, and the first my office knew about it was when it went out on Twitter and became a subject of public conversation.
JOURNALIST: [inaudible]
PM: Mr Brough should be dis-endorsed. That's what should happen here.
Question: [inaudible]
PM: Well I've certainly been very clear on my view about Mr Abbott and his conduct and the conduct of his colleagues. Here we are yet again, Mr Abbot saying that he condemns behaviour, but we see a pattern of behaviour, it doesn't go away.
Standing next to signs that describe me offensively, Liberal Party functions that you know mock the death of my father and then we the see this, a pattern of behaviour just time after time after time.
Mr Abbott's solution to this pattern of behaviour is not to show any leadership, I mean he's effectively stood by Mr Brough.
I mean Mr Brough is retaining his endorsement.
Presumably if Mr Abbott becomes Prime Minister Mr Brough will be a senior minister in the Abbott government, I mean is Mr Abbott ruling out giving him the portfolio of the Status of Women?
JOURNALIST: [inaudible]
PM: I was in Parliament, I was aware that Mr Jones and Mr Husic have had something to say about this.
There's a difference here I think.
Neither Mr Jones nor Mr Husic were in Parliament when Liberal Party women rebelled when Tony Abbott was Health Minister, so concerned were they about the attitude that he was taking to RU486.
Well I was in Parliament, I was Shadow Health Minister, I saw those Liberal women rebel against Tony Abbott as Health Minister, and consequently I think Mr Abbott's conduct at that time and the fact that women in his own political party felt the need to rebel tells you something about Mr Abbott's attitudes.
Now Mr Jones and Mr Husic weren't there at the time, I was.
JOURNALIST: [inaudible]
PM: I like it when I come to Perth, you'll see more of me in Perth and we've got some things to do in Perth today.
JOURNALIST: [inaudible] decision to deny the party to school base [inaudible]
PM: Premier Barnett says this is a long standing policy in Western Australia so you really need to have that discussion with Premier Barnett.
I'd have to say what I'm more concerned about is Premier Newman excluding the Federal Minister for Education Mr Garrett from visiting schools in Queensland.
That's a naked political act and it just seems to me if you can't win the argument about school improvement and school funding somehow you lock people out of schools and prevent them putting the argument.
Well as a nation I think we're a lot, lot better than that and that conduct is truly objectionable by Premier Newman.
Thank you very much.