The Turnbull Government is throwing the full might of the Australian Federal Police’s forensic and intelligence capabilities behind efforts to stop gang-related violence in Victoria.

Victorians, like all Australians, deserve to feel safe to go about their daily lives without fear or intimidation. Plainly, the status quo is not enough.

These street gangs and criminals rely heavily on the illegal drug trade to make a profit, with no regard for the pain and damage they leave in their wake.

To crack down on these violent gangs, the Australian Federal Police (AFP) will now provide Victoria Police with additional assistance in the fight against street crime.

This is part of the Coalition Government’s additional $321.4 million investment in the AFP that we announced in this year’s Budget, the largest single funding increase for the AFP’s domestic policing capabilities in more than a decade.

This funding will unlock greater access for Victoria Police to the AFP’s world-leading forensic, intelligence and high-tech crime fighting capabilities and expertise.

Together, Victoria Police and the AFP will be able to identify, catch and prosecute these violent criminals faster than ever before.  It includes measures such as:

• A dedicated AFP out-posted intelligence officer to support Victorian anti-gang investigations;
• Advanced forensic examination capabilities and criminal intelligence mapping to support investigations; and
• Direct access to the AFP’s National Forensic Rapid Lab to fast-track evidence collection and analysis to better target criminal gangs.

The Prime Minister, the Hon Malcolm Turnbull MP, and Justice Minister The Hon Michael Keenan made the announcement during a visit to AFP headquarters in Melbourne.

This will work hand-in-hand with the multi-agency National Anti-Gangs Squad, which received $3 million in additional Federal funding last year to allow them to continue their work until June 2019.

This investment will assist police to track down and arrest violent offenders and disrupt their criminal behaviour.

The Coalition Government will not waver in the fight to protect our nation and our way of life.

PRIME MINISTER:

Thank you so much. Your Graces, Bishop Daniel and Paula. Reverend fathers and members of the congregation. Thank you so much for inviting Lucy and me to attend your mass this morning in this beautiful church.

We’re here together in this Coptic church, nearly 2,000 years of continuity to the time when the apostle Mark – who of course was born just to the west of Egypt in Cyrene – returned to Egypt and founded the church in Egypt, the Coptic Church.

Mark’s gospel begins with a passage from Isiah, which prophesised the coming of John the Baptist. But I wonder whether the apostle, when he wrote his gospel, was he thinking also of another passage of Isiah which foretold the coming of the church and the message of the Lord and the altar of the Lord, being established in the land of Egypt.

Surely nearly two millennia of history, an unbroken chain of Popes of the Coptic Church in Alexandria, that unbroken chain, says something very powerful. In the face of so much persecution and so much adversity, it says something very powerful not simply about the spirit and the indomitability of the Coptic people, but of the power of the Holy Spirit, reaching across all those years, maintaining your faith and that of your fathers and mothers, grandfathers and grandmothers before you over all that time, in the Word of the Lord.

So thank you so much for inviting us here today. I am, as you know, joined with Lucy of course and we are delighted to be here with you. With our colleagues, our parliamentary colleagues Alex Hawke, who has come with his wife Amelia and his children Jack and Lachlan. We are after all, the Party of family values. We have lots of babies in the Coalition at the moment so we’re practicing what we preach. And of course, the babies of the next generation. Lucy and I are now at the grandparent stage of our lives. But it’s wonderful also to be joined by Craig Laundy and David Coleman and Craig Kelly. John thank you very much for your generous appreciation and work with the Government. In particular, the work of immigration and I’ll pass on to Peter Dutton the kind words you had about him.

Let me say to you my friends, that we in Australia are the most successful multicultural society in the world. We are.

And you could not imagine modern Australia in all its diversity and magnificence, without you. What you have done, what your families have done, the commitment you’ve made – respecting our values, freedom, democracy, the rule of law, mutual respect – there is the foundation. That mutual respect is the foundation of the harmony we enjoy in Australia, in a world where regrettably, as we see, particularly in the Middle East where there is so little harmony and so much intolerance.

One of the greatest tragedies of our times has been the persecution of Christians right through the Middle East. It is a devastating tragedy to see the persecution of Churches that were founded by the apostles, by men who knew Jesus, men who had walked with Jesus, worked with Jesus. His apostles foundations, these Churches, the most ancient in the world, as Bishop Daniel described, these have been threatened. And I am delighted to hear from Bishop Paula, how strongly President el-Sisi is standing up to defend the Coptics and standing up for the unity of Egypt, defying the Islamist scourge that is seeking to destroy Christianity in the Middle East. But also, is a disease within Islam itself.

We mustn’t mince words here. We have to be very clear-eyed about this. As President el-Sisi and I have discussed this matter directly – and I’ll come to your requests in a moment your Grace, your Grace – I’ve discussed these matters with President el-Sisi and he has called it out for what it is. These terrorists, these people are blasphemers and heretics. They seek to destroy their own religion as they seek to destroy others.

They must be resisted, defied and destroyed. That is my commitment and the commitment of my Government. My friends, we stand with you to defy the terrorists.

You know, you have within your own history and the experience of many of you, all of your families, you have a reminder if how important mutual respect and multiculturalism is. In every respect. The most successful cities in the Mediterranean – Alexandria, Istanbul, Constantinople, Smyrna of course – were all cities that at their height, when they were greatest, were thoroughly multicultural. Diversity brings strength. A diverse society, a multicultural society, is a powerful society, because all of us are enriched by the experience, by the insight, by the culture of everybody else. That is the genius of a successful multicultural society. So much of that has been lost in Egypt. So much of that has been lost especially in other parts of the Eastern Mediterranean.

So what we have in Australia is precious. We can never be complacent about it. We live in a world where you see communities that have lived together with relative harmony for hundreds of years, that apparently no longer can do so. It is extraordinary in the 21st century, you would have to say that looking across the whole world, there is less tolerance than there was before. You would think with all of our sophisticated scientific advancement, we could have also made more progress in terms of our social interactions.

But Australia is different. We are stronger because we are diverse. We are stronger because we maintain that mutual respect. That is why we make no apologies for reinforcing the fundamental values of Australia and of Australian citizenship.

We say that what we have done here is something of which we can all be proud.

We say what we have created here is a remarkable nation.

We say it is founded on Australian values which are right. They are good. They are eternal. They are strong and they are fundamentally committed to freedom, the rule of the law, democracy, mutual respect, the equality of men and women.

We all believe in that, and we say those who seek to come here and to be citizens in our country, should subscribe to those values as well. Because they’re ours and they’re right. That is our commitment.

Now as we have heard, we’ve heard today, and it is a sad tale, over the past six months, these Islamist terrorists in Egypt have targeted your community. Late last year Islamic State in Egypt claimed responsibility for the attack on St Mark Coptic Cathedral in Cairo. 27 worshippers were killed. Earlier this year, they drove 250 Coptics from north Sinai after ISIL threatened to kill them. In April as the Bishop described, ISIL attacked his church, your Grace’s church in Tanta and another in Alexandria, killing over 50 people. Of course, on the 26th of May, the ISIL terrorists attacked a convoy of Coptic Christians travelling to the monastery of Saint Samuel in Minya, killing nearly 30. Now I have written to his Holiness, Pope Tawadros II and offered the condolences of the Australian people, reaffirmed to him as I have to Bishop Daniel and I do again today, to this community, that Australia is united with the Coptic Christian community and all Egyptians and the President el-Sisi in the fight against these Islamist terrorists. They must be stopped.

Now I want to touch on the requests from the Bishop. As you know, I’m very attentive to requests from Bishops. Firstly, I look forward to joining you all during the course of Pope Tawadros’ visit to Australia later this year.

As you know the numbers are tight in the Federal Parliament so we’ll have to make sure that I’m there for votes, but we seem to be winning a few votes in the Parliament at the moment. Well, we win most of them actually, naturally, but often by very tight margins, so all of us have to be there. But we’ll certainly look forward to seeing the Pope.

Now as to your second request, it has already been granted!

I had a very good discussion with President Sisi in China recently at an international gathering, the G20 in fact, and we discussed all of these issues and many others. I encouraged him, invited him to come to Australia and he’s encouraged me to visit Egypt as well. So that would be good, if both could be achieved. But certainly we would look forward to President Sisi coming to Australia.

Can I say just on that subject of leadership, ISIL Islamist terrorists – and of course there are other Al-Qaeda … – but as you know, these are people that the vast majority of Muslims regard as blasphemers. In fact many leading Muslim leaders around the world have said to me: “They’re not Muslims at all. They are so vile, they are such terrorists, they’re blasphemers.” Our best allies in the battle to defeat ISIS are Muslim leaders of courage, who are prepared to stand up and defy them. To say that Islam is a religion that is compatible with democracy and moderation. That is what President Joko Widodo says in Indonesia. That is what President Sisi says in Egypt. Those leaders, moderate leaders of a moderate tradition, are vital allies in the war to defeat ISIL. Because it threatens, it seeks to destroy Islam, and undermine Islam, at the same time as it seeks to destroy other religions and of course, in particular in the Middle East, in this shocking, terrible tragedy, of the assault on the most ancient Christian churches in the world.

So I’m heartened to hear from Bishop Paula how strongly he your community sir, your Grace, is working with the President, with the government of Egypt, the armed forces of Egypt, in solidarity to defeat these terrorists.

Now you’ve noted the hard work of our ambassador in Egypt and you’ve thanked Julie Bishop as well for the great work that she and her Department have done. But I want to note, as you know I believe already, that in light of the recent terrorist attacks our Assistant Minister for Immigration and Border Protection Alex Hawke is now reviewing all of the protection applications by Coptic Christians that have been refused on administrative appeal, to ensure that our immigration decisions reflect the current situation in Egypt.

Since 2013, more than 550 protection visas have been granted to Coptic Christians fleeing persecution. We are, as the Bishop acknowledged, working with the Church in Egypt to assist with the victims of the Palm Sunday attacks which occurred earlier in the year.

Now our commitment is to keep Australians safe. That is the first duty of every Government. It is the first duty of my Government. We have been unrelenting in our support for our security and intelligence agencies, in our support for our Australian Defence Force. We have provided them with the legislation that they need to keep us safe.

We’ve change our laws and we do not take a set and forget approach. I want to assure you of this; yes, our agencies are the best in the world. Yes, our laws are the world’s best. In fact many other countries and other leaders are seeking to emulate what we’ve done. For example we changed the law very recently so that if a person is in jail on a terrorist charge and they’re getting to the end of their sentence, and it’s clear that they remain a threat to the community, in the sense that they remain an extremist, then they will be kept in jail after the end of their sentence. They will not be let out. This post-sentence detention is a tough law, there’s no question about that. But it gives you an indication of the determination we have to keep you and every other Australian safe from terrorism.

We’ve taken the same approach with parole and bail. You would have seen recently in a meeting with the Premiers, I secured their agreement to there being a presumption against giving parole or bail to anybody who is seeking it who has a connection with, or a history of advocacy for or support for terrorism. We’ve given the largest single commitment, over $300 million of additional funding to the Australian Federal Police, to enable them to have the capabilities to keeping us secure in the fight against terrorism.

And of course, we’ve given our Defence Forces who are fighting in the Middle East, supporting the Coalition forces to destroy ISIL both in Iraq and Syria, the legal means to target terrorists and destroy them, whatever they’re doing – whether they’re holding a gun, or working in a back office.

So we are absolutely determined to keep you safe.

Now let me say in conclusion, again, thank you for inviting us here today. As John described, I have an interest, I do, I have a great interest in the history of the early Church and particularly in the history of Alexandria. So this is just a joy for me to be here. I’m fascinated with the way in which the Greek alphabet was adapted and expanded a little bit to be used to write the Coptic language. Coptic is – again we talked about nearly 2,000 years of continuity from the visit of Mark to where he established the Church and the Coptic language of course, its continuity, is many thousands of years going right back to the time of the Pharaohs.

So you’ve blessed us today. Thank you for that your Graces. But this has been a great blessing, a very moving occasion for Lucy and me to be here and our parliamentary colleagues and I should acknowledge Mr Atalla from the state parliament. It’s  good to be with you sir. Truly, we are the greatest multicultural society in the world. We would not be that great multicultural society without your contribution and that of many other groups who come from different parts of the world, all melding together, integrating, uniting.

Why are we uniting? Because we share the same values. Our values do not discriminate between religion, race, the colour of your skin or ethnicity. They are eternal, universal human values. They are ours. I know that you, and we, all of us, 24 million Australians are united in defending them, defeating the Islamist terrorists that seek to undermine them and defeat us.

We will defeat them.

We will stand with you. We will stand, 24 million Australians, determined forever to be free.

Thank you so much.

 [ENDS]

The Turnbull Government’s plan for real needs-based funding for Australia’s schools passed the Parliament this morning, ensuring students will get the support and quality education they need to succeed.

This historic reform will deliver tangible benefits to students, parents and teachers. It represents a major investment in Australia’s future.

Our Quality Schools reforms deliver an additional $23.5 billion, on top of the 2016 Budget, for Australian schools over the next decade and we will ensure that investment is distributed according to need, as envisaged by David Gonski’s Review of School Funding in 2011.

Our reforms ensure students with the same need within the same sector attract the same support from the Commonwealth Government, regardless of where they live.

Following the passage of the Australian Education Amendment Bill 2017, all schools currently below the Schooling Resource Standard (SRS) will be brought to their fair Commonwealth funding level by 2023 and schools that are notionally above the SRS will be brought to their Commonwealth share of funding by 2027 to ensure a manageable transition for those communities.

The Turnbull Government’s plan ensures students who need the most support, get the most support as quickly as possible.

The transition arrangements to get to the SRS do not change the final structural position of the Government’s funding or budget in 2027.

Alongside the Commonwealth’s increased investment, states and territories will be expected to provide 95 per cent of the SRS by 2023. Further, we will appoint a National School Resource Board as was recommended by the 2011 ‘Gonski Review’.

Under the Government’s reforms, by 2023 the Commonwealth’s funding for government schools will rise from the current average of 17 per cent of the SRS to 20 per cent, and the Commonwealth’s funding for non-government schools will grow from an average of 77 per cent to 80 per cent.

While maintaining the historic role of the federal government as the majority funder of non-government schools, this will see the Commonwealth continue to increase its share of funding for government schools, which in 2013-14 stood at 13.4 per cent and under the previous Government in 2009-10 it was just 10.8 per cent.

For the first time, the support for students with a disability will be informed by the Nationally Consistent Collection of Data, which was first committed to under the Gillard Labor Government, ensuring need drives funding allocation rather than the different definitions of disability that exist between jurisdictions.

While a strong level of funding for schools is vital, what’s more important is how that funding is used.

Before the end of 2017, David Gonski AC will chair a panel of education experts to deliver the Review to Achieve Educational Excellence in Australian Schools. The Review will provide advice on how this extra Commonwealth funding should be used by Australian schools to improve student achievement and school performance.

Bill Shorten and the Labor Party should be ashamed of and embarrassed by their actions. Voting against increased and truly needs-based investment in Australia’s schools shows that the Labor Party values political expediency over the needs of the nation’s children and grandchildren.

The Turnbull Government thanks the respective minor party and independent Senators and Members for their constructive and considered contributions to the future of Commonwealth support for Australia’s schools.

Along with support from Gonski Review panelists Ken Boston, Kathryn Greiner AO and David Gonski himself, the Government’s plan has been backed by independent think tanks including The Grattan Institute and The Mitchell Institute as well as schools, families and educators such as former head of the Australian Education Union Dianne Foggo AM.

These reforms are focused on the needs of each and every Australian student to ensure they get the support they deserve to set them up for their future.

PRIME MINISTER: Good morning.

I am here with Simon Birmingham the Education Minister. Last night as you know, we have secured an outstanding result for Australian schools and Australian students and their parents and their teachers.

You know this is the biggest reform in Commonwealth school funding ever.

For the first time that which has always been aspired to but never achieved has been achieved. National, consistent, needs-based funding right across the country.

A very substantial increase in the Commonwealth investment in our schools, $23.5 billion over 10 years. But above all, real structural reform – it is consistent, it is transparent and it’s needs-based.

It’s exactly as David Gonski recommended and where it is the antithesis of what Labor delivered.

Labor had 27 separate deals, contradictory, the same school with the same needs in the same state getting radically different treatment than it did in another. Inconsistent between systems, between states. It was unfair. It couldn’t be justified.

What we are delivering is fair, consistent needs-based funding.

Now, now that we’ve got the funding model right, the next step is to make sure we get the great educational outcomes. The funding model is right, and it’s fair and there’s substantial additional dollars there. The next stage of Gonski 2.0 is the educational outcomes. And that’s what David Gonski will be doing, the second stage of his work and I was speaking with him about this just a little while ago, and that is to ensure that we make the additional money work to deliver greater, higher quality teaching, higher quality educational outcomes so that we can get Australian students where they belong, at the top of the class.

MINISTER FOR EDUCATION AND TRAINING: Thanks very much Prime Minister.

Well, it was an outstanding outcome last night and I want to thank those of the crossbench in the Senate who worked with us to achieve this historic reform to back Australian schools, hard working principals, teachers, in our schools, to be the best they can be in helping our children to achieve the most they possibly can in terms of their educational outcome.

This is an historic outcome as the Prime Minister has indicated because it will see all schools across Australia transition to be funded under a consistent, fair, needs-based model, based on the recommendations of the Gonski report.

It’s six years since David Gonski handed down his report and finally we see the Parliament put into place what it recommended. We’re thrilled that’s the case.

Now as you know there was some changes in terms of what occurred on the Senate floor to the model that was put in place. This will see an additional $4.9 billion invested in Australian schools over the next decade. This will take to total of around $23.5 billion of additional support relative to the budget position last year.

That’s a demonstration of our government’s commitment to make sure the resources are there for all the schools who need it.

The changes we made bring forward the transition period for the vast majority of Australian schools, all of those who were receiving less than their fair share of funding to a 6-year period. So that 6-year period will see faster rates of growth across all school systems and sectors and in doing so, ensure the resources are there sooner for that fair, consistent, needs-based funding model.

So an extra and faster delivery of fairer funding for all Australian schools, clear expectations in terms of the states, and adoption and establishment of a new nationals schools resourcing body, an entity recommended by the Gonski report, which will help to continually improve and refine the funding model into the future so that all sectors, all systems, all schools, all stakeholders can have confidence in it.

Now I look forward as the Prime Minister said to getting on with the job of not just talking about the funding and how it’s delivered, but most importantly, how it’s used.

We’ve put the bucks in place – how do we get the best bang for our bucks?

How do we make sure in Australian schools the money is used as effectively as possible on evidence-based measures to help students be their best, to help every school achieve the best for their kids?

That is what this is about – outcomes in schools for our children and that’s where our focus will be.

JOURNALIST: Mr Turnbull, states have complained that the Commonwealth tore up agreements, that it didn’t consult them, and now that amendments dictates how much they have to spend on their schools. Does Gonski 2.0 show that federalism is dead?

PRIME MINISTER: Well, the needs-based funding model that we’re setting up was warmly welcomed by premiers at the last COAG and can I say to you that the recommendations of Gonski have been for national needs-based funding were clearly right.

But the fact is that the last Labor government did not have the courage or the conviction to follow it. They set up one separate special deal after another, 27 in total, that failed Australian students, failed Australian schools.

We’re delivering on a consistent needs-based funding model as David Gonski recommended and when I was last with the premiers in Hobart, they were very pleased with it.

JOURNALIST: To get this through, once again you have had to reach for the cheque book to the tune of $5 billion. You’ve had to reach a temporary arrangement with the Catholics. Are these concessions impositions on the budget starting to stack up? And just personally, is that a satisfying way of having to reach policy outcomes or compromises?

PRIME MINISTER: Well, let me remind you, nearly a year ago, after the election, and many distinguished members of the press gallery took the view the Parliament was unmanageable. And we wouldn’t be able to get anything past. And yet we’ve had great success in delivering on our agenda, on our programs through this 45th Parliament. And you’re right, we don’t have a majority in the Senate, a long way from it. But we work with the crossbench, we respect the Parliament the Australian people elected. They elected this Parliament. Every single one, every Senator, every member of the house. We work with them to achieve the right outcomes for Australia and we have done this here, again.

What Simon and our Senate team have done, working with the crossbench – and we thank the crossbench for their support, we thank all of our colleagues in the Coalition for their support – because what we’ve been able to do is deliver a historic reform. This is the first time that Commonwealth funding for schools has been nationally, consistent, transparent, and above all, needs-based. Now that is a historic achievement. And it’s an achievement of my government, of Simon’s leadership as Education Minister, and indeed of the 45th Parliament.

JOURNALIST: Can I ask you about the South Australian Government’s bank tax? The business community is absolutely filthy and they’re blaming you, your government for letting the genie out of the bottle and Jay Weatherill this morning was essentially saying they were just doing what the Commonwealth Government is doing. Do you accept any responsibility for this and do you accept some criticism that this is a failure now of tax reform at a federal and state level now the states are running off willy-nilly?

PRIME MINISTER: The first thing is Phil – I will answer this and then let’s come back to schools.

The first thing is states obviously have taxing powers and they can raise such taxes as they wish and they do so. The second thing I observe is that the major bank levy that we imposed and is now legislated, is a national and consistent levy on bank liabilities, major bank liabilities.

The South Australian tax that was announced yesterday, is of course it’s limited only to South Australia. The question that Mr Weatherill has got to answer is that is his decision going to make business in South Australia more competitive or less competitive?

See, it’s one thing to have a tax that covers the whole country, but when a state imposes higher business taxes within its own jurisdiction, is that actually going to drive investment, support jobs within that state or is it in fact going to make it less competitive?

JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, what is the cost over the forward estimates of that extra $4.9 billion? Will that be reflected in MYEFO and will there be commensurate savings in MYEFO to offset that?

MINISTER FOR EDUCATION AND TRAINING: Sure – that’s around $1.5 billion over the forward estimates and of course, it will be reflected in MYEFO and as is always the case under this government, we make sure that we pay for our spending in terms of how we continue to work to bring the budget back to surplus.

JOURNALIST: So you’re saying the forecast surplus won’t be impacted by the $5 billion you negotiated last night?

MINISTER FOR EDUCATION AND TRAINING: I’ll let the Treasurer and the Finance Minister speak about the forecast surplus, but we always – as the government has always done – made sure that we pay for our spending commitments and that we will continue to work to bring the budget back to surplus in the year that is forecast in the budget.

JOURNALIST: Prime Minister, you’ve said previously that spending more money doesn’t necessarily get better educational outcomes. You’ve cited Kazakhstan as an example which spends significantly less than us but is actually outperforming our students. What is $23 billion going to get us that we don’t already have? Will you connect this with key performance indicators for our students?

MINISTER FOR EDUCATION AND TRAINING: A few points there.

Firstly, additional funding gets us fair and needs-based funding that ensures that schools across the country can have equal opportunity to succeed, kids in those schools can have equal opportunity to succeed. That’s critical.

Yes, you’re buying a better funding model through some of that investment but indeed we want to make sure it’s used effectively. That’s the point of the new David Gonski reform. And under this legislation, we have ensured there are provisions that expect states and territories to work with us when David Gonski hands down his next report and he identifies the evidence-based reforms to lift student performance.

We expect the states and territories to work with us. Agreeing on reforms to help further lift the quality of our teachers and to help ensure that they can access the best programs, products to use in their classroom and to know which of those will be most applicable to their classroom environment, to help their kids succeed in the different areas whether it’s STEM subjects, English subjects, basic literacy skills – getting the states to agree. And under this legislation we actually have some mechanisms to hold states and territories to account to follow through on those commitments.

That’s all really important in saying that no longer is it just a case of the Commonwealth handing over a blank cheque. It’s about the Commonwealth working in partnership with the states and territories to deliver high quality education around the country and ensuring that when they make commitments, we can hold them to account to ensure the benefits flow through to kids and classrooms.

JOURNALIST: As you enter into that process, is it inevitable that teacher work practices will need to change? And how can that be achieved given some of the goodwill or, the divisiveness that’s developed in this debate particularly with the education union?

MINISTER FOR EDUCATION AND TRAINING: Teachers are incredibly hardworking. I have to say, on my visits to schools, particularly since the Prime Minister and I stood alongside David Gonski a couple of months ago now, the enthusiasm from teachers, for what it is we’re doing, for fair, needs-based funding has been strong. Teachers, of course, have been adapting to a range of pressures and challenges for a long time. Social changes, technological changes, curriculum changes – they are having to work hard to keep up with all of those different changes and practices.

This reform will help ensure that they can keep doing so. The resources and support is there for them to do so. Then the extra work of the new Gonski review should also help to provide a clear evidence base for teachers that enable them to see what it is in the classroom that they can do better to help their kids succeed and to know that there’s thorough evidence and research underpinning those actions.

JOURNALIST: When a Coalition MP or Minister has a spending idea they are often told find a way to pay for it, and we’ll consider it. Is that ever put to a crossbencher such as Nick Xenophon or is that just an exercise in futility, asking him to identify savings to satisfy their demands?

PRIME MINISTER: Phil, the job of government is to deliver for the Australian people. To deliver the right outcomes.

And in the case of school education, as you know, I mean look, let’s not kid ourselves, let’s put all the politics aside for now – everyone has known what we needed to do. Everyone has known for years. We needed to have needs-based school funding that was consistent across Australia. But the fact is, governments and in particular the last Labor government, did not have the courage to deliver that. Instead, they stitched up all of these deals on the fly. Bill Shorten, running around the country doing one deal after another and they were all inconsistent, utterly unfair.

Now what we have done is taken on this big challenge, this big challenge of leadership, of government, of policy, of justice and we have delivered a nationally consistent, transparent needs-based funding model and we have put substantially more money to that over the next decade.

But now the next step, as Simon has said, is to ensure that we get the maximum educational bang for the taxpayers’ buck. That we get there great outcomes for our kids so that they get to the top of the class. So that we get the outcomes that we deserve, that they deserve and that they need.

So this is a great day for Australian schools. It’s a great day for economic reform. It’s a historic moment.

For the first time, people will be able to say that every school in Australia will receive Commonwealth funding based on its need. That is justice, that is reform, that’s leadership.

Thank you all very much.

AMANDA:

Let’s see what gets the Ghoulies of Malcolm from Canberra. Hello Malcolm, what gets your Ghoulies?

PRIME MINISTER:

The years of inconsistent and unfair school funding gets my Ghoulies. Or it got my Ghoulies until 2 o’clock this morning. We’ve changed it and made it right.

[Laughter]

AMANDA:

Good morning Prime Minister. Now how does this happen? Because I know you’re all about to go on your six week winter break, so it had to be resolved last night. But how can you do any thinking at 2am in the morning?

PRIME MINISTER:

You just have to stay alert all the time but you know it is a great win for kids, it’s a great win for schools.

What we’ve delivered here is one of the biggest reforms – I would say – at the federal level, the biggest reform to education in our nation’s history.

We’re investing an extra $23 billion in schools over the next decade but for the first time every student in every state in every school will benefit from genuine needs-based funding.

So the money the Labor Party had under Gillard, you know, they had 27 different deals with different school systems, different jurisdictions which were all inconsistent.

What we’re replacing that is with a single national, consistent, transparent needs-based model. It’s a really big reform. Massive.

JONES:

Extraordinary. You know it’s extraordinary how much you sound like the Prime Minister Malcolm. It’s amazing!

[Laughter]

PRIME MINISTER:

That’s right.

AMANDA:

I’ll tell you what, it was quite momentous last night because we had Larissa Waters from the Greens breastfeeding as the vote was going down. She’s the first politician to do that. Did you look at that and think: ‘I’m starving, let’s get some pizza’?

PRIME MINISTER:

No, look, seeing mothers with babies like that, it just melts my heart. I think it’s wonderful. The more kids we have around the House down here in Canberra the better.

JONESY:

Exactly. Well you go and get some shut-eye Prime Minister!

AMANDA:

What are you going to do in your six weeks off?

PRIME MINISTER:

Well look I am going to take a little time off with Lucy, a little break.

But it’s work – I mean we’ll be going to the G20 in Germany which is the big international meeting of the top 20 economies. But also the reality is that politicians probably work harder and do more, or certainly they work as hard but certainly do a lot more miles when Parliament is not sitting because you’re running around the countryside even if it’s just your electorate. It is a very busy job being an MP or a Senator.

JONESY:

Will you be wearing lederhosen when you’re over in Germany? I can imagine Donald Trump and you standing there side by side in lederhosen.

PRIME MINISTER:

No, I think I’ll stick to my regular routine of suits. The exotic attire is best left to others.

AMANDA:

Don’t they force you to wear something though when you go to those G-meetings?

PRIME MINISTER:

Yeah sometimes they have some sort of item of clothing that everyone wears but you know, the reality is that the G20 is focused on economic growth, as we are, and it will be focused on issues of trade, and how do we make sure we keep the global economy moving – that’s what is critical.

You know, everything we are doing here, Amanda, is focused on securing our future. So, you know, we talked about schools a moment ago and the new funding arrangements which are for the first time consistent and needs-based et cetera, but the next stage is to ensure that we get the quality outcomes from that investment. Gonski 2.0 has David Gonski chairing the second stage of his work which is going to be focused on how we use that extra money to get the better educational outcomes for our kids because we have over many years been spending more on schools but we have not been getting better results.

JONESY:

There you go. Well, when you see Donald just say: ‘Oh mate you didn’t see that thing I did at the Ball.’

AMANDA:

Look at my lederhosen instead!

JONESY:

Have a look at my lederhosen, Donald!

[Laughter]

PRIME MINISTER:

Yes, that’s right – okay.

AMANDA:

Well we appreciate you calling in.

JONESY:

Yes.

PRIME MINISTER:

Yeah it’s great to talk. Okay thanks a lot.

[ENDS]