Former prime minister John Howard has criticised Cate Blanchett's widely lauded speech at Gough Whitlam's funeral as outrageous and wrong.
Speaking at Whitlam's memorial service at the Sydney Town Hall last month, Blanchett credited Australia's 21st prime minister with introducing free tertiary education and healthcare.
"The loss I felt came down to something very deep and very simple - I am the beneficiary of free, tertiary education," the 45-year-old actress told an applauding audience, referring to the Whitlam government's abolition of university fees in 1974.
That policy stayed in place for 14 years until 1989, when the Hawke government established HECS, meaning students would get a loan to cover their tuition fees and graduate with a debt to be paid off when earning a decent wage.
But Howard has taken a swipe at Blanchett, saying her praise was misdirected because 70 per cent of university students before 1972 had their fees covered by Commonwealth scholarships.
"That speech of Cate Blanchett's was outrageous," he told News Corp.
"Cate Blanchett is a talented actor, I admire her talent, but to suggest that Whitlam introduced free university education is wrong."
"The last three years of my university education were completely free and that was 11 years before Whitlam came to power," Howard said.
"This idea that it just arrived (with Whitlam) is complete nonsense and it ought to be called out more frequently."
