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Labor’s shadow education minister and deputy leader, Tanya Plibersek, has seized on comments by the Liberal MP Ian Goodenough to claim a “revolt” against the government on education funding.

On Tuesday night, Goodenough told the House of Representatives:



The Independent Schools Council of Australia is calling on the government to provide clarity on school funding arrangements for 2018 so that independent schools have the capacity to plan their operations going forward with confidence.

He noted that some schools will have their commonwealth funding reduced as a result of needs-based education funding, changes in the way need is assessed and the introduction of the schooling resource standard from 2014.

Currently, considerable uncertainty attaches to arrangements for non-government school funding beyond 2017.

This is a minor heresy for a Coalition MP because Labor has argued the failure to fix a new formula from 2018 has caused uncertainty but the education minister, Simon Birmingham, has said that funding is still growing so there is nothing that harms schools’ long term planning.

On Wednesday, Plibersek said: