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Media Release
SENATE REPORT INTO HIGHER EDUCATION REFORMS A POLITICAL STUNT
7 November 2003 MIN 517/03
Senator Kim Carr’s report on the Government’s higher education reform package is nothing more than a politically motivated exercise intended to frustrate and delay the Government’s vital higher education reforms.
The Government is poised to inject more than $10 billion dollars over ten years in new public investment into Australia’s universities - creating more places, supporting regional universities and lifting standards.
Labor announced it would block that money before the package was even revealed. It is now clothing its political obstructionism in committees and inquiries.
The Labor Party’s real agenda is to play politics but the cost is to deny universities and students critical support no matter what the long-term cost:
- Labor wants to throw almost 9,500 students onto the streets by denying them the opportunity of a fee-paying place – a right that Labor is more than happy to extend to an unlimited number of overseas students.
- Labor wants to continue to deny universities access to additional revenue – funds they urgently need to improve quality and reduce class sizes.
- Labor wants to reduce HECS for maths and science students in its own policy but pass the
$220 million bill straight onto the universities.
- Labor professes to be campaigners on student debt issues yet it is quite happy to retain a student loan scheme (SFSS), with effective interest rates of up to 16%, which is loading the poorest students in the education system with $1.4 billion in debts they will never be able to repay.
Only weeks ago Labor voted against $1.5 billion in additional funding for universities and almost 32,000 new university places in the lower house of Parliament.
The reform package includes:
- an additional $404 million in base funding for universities;
- $122 million over four years to support regional campuses;
- $121 million in additional funding to support the practical component of teaching and nursing programmes;
- approximately 25,000 fully-funded places to replace marginally-funded places;
- more than 6,500 new fully-funded places for universities over the next five years, including for medicine, teaching and nursing;
- $161 million in scholarships to assist students with their education and accommodation costs;
- $188 million to support teaching and learning in universities, including a National Institute for Learning and Teaching;
- two new loan schemes to assist those students who choose to pay the full cost of their education, and those wanting to spend a semester or two studying overseas;
- $22 million to support a range of equity initiatives, including funding for indigenous students, students with disabilities and those from disadvantaged backgrounds;
- $55 million to support workplace productivity in universities; and
- $36 million to support collaboration and structural reform.
Australians want their children to be able to attend world-class institutions and obtain a quality education.
They want their children to have genuine choice about where they study and what they pay. They want their children to have a say in the teaching they receive.
Labor cannot make the hard decisions needed to strengthen Australia’s future. The Government is prepared to make the tough decisions if it means building a quality university system.
As the Vice Chancellor of the University of Wollongong, Professor Gerard Sutton, said:
“.....if this package goes down in the Senate, then universities will be facing a genuine crisis.”
The Bulletin. 24 June, 2003 p.48
Media contact:
Dr Nelson’s Office: Ross Hampton 0419 484 095
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