Tony Abbott backflips on school funding as Coalition says it will match Labor

TONY Abbott has vowed to match federal Labor's Gonski school funding boost in an attempt to neutralise education as an election issue.

TONY Abbott has vowed to match federal Labor's Gonski school funding boost in an attempt to neutralise education as an election issue.

The Opposition Leader today walked away from his longstanding objection to Labor's Better Schools Plan,  guaranteeing payments to all states for the next four years, even for jurisdictions that have so far refused to sign on to the deal.

But, in an important divergence from Labor's plan, the Coalition will dismantle the powers of the federal minister to interfere in the management of individual schools.

Mr Abbott said he and Kevin Rudd were now on a “unity ticket” on the issue of school funding.

“The essential difference between Labor and the Coalition is not over funding,” he said.

“It is over the amount of control that the commonwealth government should have. Under the Coalition, you'll get the funding but you won't get the strings attached.”

The announcement does not require the states to contribute the additional funds they were required to under the Gonski plan, but Mr Abbott said the Coalition would work with the states to come up with an appropriate joint-funding deal.

“This will provide schools and parents with the funding certainty they deserve. It means that the Coalition will match Labor dollar-for-dollar over the next four years,” Mr Abbott said.

“We will work cooperatively and constructively with all states and territories to negotiate a fair and sustainable national funding model.

“This will not be Labor's Canberra takeover of state schools, but a fair national funding model that delivers better outcomes for students.”

Labor is yet to secure the agreement of Queensland, Western Australia, Victoria and the Northern Territory for its Gonski plan.

Opposition education spokesman Christopher Pyne said the announcement would allow schools and parents to plan for the coming school year knowing their funding would be the same regardless of who won the election.

However, he said the Coalition believed, unlike Labor, that it should not run the nation's schools from Canberra.

“The states and territories, the non-government schools, can do what they do best, which is to teach students, run their schools, manage their own budgets and funds,” he said.

Queensland Education Minister John-Paul Langbroek said Mr Abbott had addressed some of the concerns that had stopped the state signing up to Labor's deal.

“He's already acknowledged that there'll be no federal bureaucracy taking over Queensland schools and covering our schools in more red tape,” he told ABC radio.

“And he's prepared to acknowledge that the state is putting in what it can afford, but the federal government under Tony Abbott will give us the two-for-one dollars the Labor government is promising too.”

Education Minister Bill Shorten branded the Coalition's backflip a “panicked” move, as he foreshadowed Victoria was likely to sign up to Labor's school funding deal this weekend, clearing the way for an election to be called.

“I've got no doubt (that) what spooked the Coalition into running around and putting lipstick on their inadequate policies is that even their own political parties in their states are saying, they've said to the Coalition `get out of the way will you, we need to do business, we need to look after our schoolkids',” Mr Shorten said at a Melbourne high school.

“The opposition is panicked.

“They know that in the last month with Prime Minister Rudd there has been real momentum, they know that the Catholics have signed up to it, the independents have signed up, the Tasmanians have signed up, they know the talks in Victoria are going very well.”

Mr Shorten said negotiations to get Victoria on board with the Gonski reforms, which would leave Queensland, Western Australia and the Northern Territory as the only jurisdictions which haven't agreed, were progressing well.

“I think it is possible to get a deal this weekend,” he said. “That's our timetable.”

Mr Shorten denied the Coalition's step to match the school funding boost had denied Labor of a key electoral weapon and point of difference.

“They haven't committed to supporting the policy at all,” he said.

“For three years the opposition have trash talked our education reforms, they haven't provided the funding proposals that we have.

“They're simply not authentic and sincere on education....this is just a political fix from the Coalition.”

Australian Education Union federal president Angelo Gavrielatos says many questions still remain on Coalition education policy.

“School communities need the certainty of funding arrangements over the full six-year period, and to know they are not going to be pulled apart later,” Mr Gavrielatos said in a statement.

“If Mr Abbott is serious about his unity ticket with Kevin Rudd on Gonski, then the Coalition must commit a further $7 billion in Commonwealth funds to take the Gonski funding agreements out to 2019.”

He said state and territory governments must also be required to commit the necessary funds.

Additional reporting; AAP