News Jaya

How to announce new funding without providing new funding

Ann Tolley makes an announcement: $8 million boost for high-performing polytechnics

Tertiary Education Minister Anne Tolley has announced that 12 polytechnics and institutes of technology are to provide up to 700 new student places following an $8 million funding boost."This additional funding for 2010, part of the Government's Youth Opportunities package, will help these institutions cope with forecast enrolment growth"

Looks like the government is announcing new funding. But it is not new funding. Tolley made a similar announcement in August

An $8 million funding boost will help high-performing polytechnics and institutes of technology collectively provide up to 700 new places to help cope with forecast enrolment growth next year, Tertiary Education Minister Anne Tolley announced today.

"This one-off funding will be available to deal with expected increases in student enrolments in 2010 resulting from the impact of the economic downturn on youth employment opportunities," Mrs Tolley says.

It wouldn't have taken very long to write today's media release I`m sure. Just change "one-off funding" to "additional funding", to make it look like a one-off announcement of additional funding for polytechs that are not as high performing as they were initally made out to be - but still have caps on student numbers.