Brumby to reveal school stimulus costings, after all

The Brumby government has backed down and agreed to give the federal government all individual project costs under the BER program.

The Brumby government has backed down and agreed to give the federal government all individual project costs under the BER program.

THE Brumby government last night backed down and agreed to give the federal government all individual project costs under the school stimulus program after negotiations with federal Education Minister Simon Crean.

After negotiations with federal Education Minister Simon Crean, Victorian Premier John Brumby last night joined the South Australian government in agreeing to comply with the most urgent recommendation made by Brad Orgill last week for each educational authority to publish project costs in a "nationally common structure".

But Queensland and Western Australia are still yet to come to the table, having indicated they would not comply with Mr Orgill's urgent recommendation, in which he stated last week was needed "in the interest of transparency and public accountability".

Mr Brumby had earlier said that immediately publishing individual school template costs -- which make up about half of the state's 1200-plus BER projects -- would increase the cost of future construction as the government plans to reuse the templates in its own school renovation program.

"I have got very clear advice that if we release costings of projects that are still in the market, it will distort the market and lift the cost of providing the education facilities," he said.

"Our position hasn't changed. When the projects are complete, we will release the costings."

But last night a spokesman for Mr Brumby said there had been a breakthrough in negotiations and the government had agreed to hand over template costs to the federal government.

"In line with recommendation 1 of the Orgill report, the Victorian government will provide project specific cost data to the Australian government so that it can be released publicly when a nationally common structure with consistent definitions is in place," he said.

The Queensland Education and Training Minister, Geoff Wilson, said only that he would "contribute to the development of a national database".

"A formal response to DEEWR, responding to the federal taskforce report, is being prepared by the Department of Education and Training and will be forwarded in due course," Mr Wilson said. And the Barnett government in Western Australia also looks set to continue its policy not to publish the data.

"The (WA Education) Department has noted the recommendation and will liaise with the Building the Education Revolution Taskforce on the best way to provide consistent and specific project data on costs," the department's executive director of infrastructure, James Thom, said.

ADDITIONAL REPORTING: DAVID NASON, NATASHA BITA, AMANDA O'BRIEN