A non-believing Australian Prime Minister has made God the winner in the Australian budget.
School chaplains at 1,000 extra schools will receive A$222 million more. The significant increase in funding comes despite a High Court challenge to the programme on constitutional grounds and speculation prior to the budget that the future of the school chaplaincy programme was in doubt.
The school chaplaincy announcement was one of the Labor Government’s major education announcements.
The $222 million increase promised before the election will provide chaplains for up to 3,700 schools until 2014.
Schools will be able to access up to $60,000 over three years to establish or expand chaplaincy services.
While funding is available to all faiths, most school chaplains are Christian.
The extra funding seems to have come at the expense of the “education revolution” of former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.
Rudd’s trade training centres promised to secondary schools face delays and the $2.4 billion digital education revolution programme has also suffered significant cuts.