Former Australian prime minister Julia Gillard has praised the Abbott government for maintaining funding for a program designed to educate children in the world's poorest countries.
Gillard, speaking in Washington DC on Monday at the Brookings Institution, said she was pleased the change of government in Australia did not lead to a cut in the financial support for the Global Partnership for Education (GPE).
Gillard will take up the role of chair of the GPE's board next month.
"I am pleased that the allocations we made in government have been sustained by the current government even though they have made changes to aid arrangements in the aid budget overall," Gillard told an audience at a Brookings event titled New Ideas to Scale Up and Finance Global Education.
"So, it's good to see the GPE seems to have persuaded both sides of politics that it is a really important investment."
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Gillard, as chair of GPE, will be responsible for leading fundraising efforts to provide education to 57 million out-of-school children worldwide.
The GPE, based in Washington DC, is the only multilateral partnership devoted to getting all children in the world's poorest countries into school for a quality education.
Established in 2002, the GPE is comprised of close to 60 developing countries, donor governments, international organisations, the private sector, teachers and civil society/non-governmental organisations.
