Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance) Share this | Hansard source

I commend the member for Cunningham for her words, or most of her words. I point out to the House that on 21 September 2012 I joined the member for Cunningham, in her former capacity as Parliamentary Secretary for Higher Education and Skills, when she officially opened a $48.6 million hub for research and education in plant and animal sciences, food production and security, animal health, and water and environmental sciences at Charles Sturt University Wagga Wagga campus. I know that the member for Cunningham knows what an important role this hub is going to play in the future. I acknowledge the role her government played in making sure that that funding was available to CSU Wagga Wagga. As CSU Vice-Chancellor and President Professor Andrew Vann said at the time:

This impressive building is about providing a space where applied and fundamental researchers can be innovative and ultimately produce science for the benefit of Australia, particularly for our agricultural sector.

You know, Mr Deputy Speaker, how important our agriculture sector is to the nation. Professor Vann further said:

Its location in regional Australia in the heart of the Murray Darling Basin will help the scientists engage with rural industries, agencies and students.

I know the member for Cunningham endorsed those remarks of Professor Vann and all present on that day. But I would advise her not to lecture the current government about our immigration policies and allege that the Howard government was lax in its rules on immigration policy. The Howard government had tight immigration rules and that is why we had a good situation with immigration at that point in time. Certainly under the Abbott-Truss government, we are getting back to where we should be as far as immigration policy settings are concerned.

Australia has a proud reputation for quality in international education. It is one of our biggest exports and a driver of many international students to Australia. This is not just in Australia's university sector, although that makes a significant contribution to the number of international students, it is also in our schools and our technical colleges both public and private. In fact, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, there was a 2009 peak of around 22 per cent of all students undertaking tertiary study coming from overseas. Under the previous government, however, this trend was just as sharply reversed in 2010-11, with a decline in a number of visa applications in the order of five per cent.

In government, Labor limited access to streamlined visa processing to universities only. No other education providers were given the same access to streamlined visa processing, taking away from the students, schools and technical colleges which also train many students to enter the workforce with a skills set the economy so desperately needs. This is why the coalition is going about rectifying what the Minister of Education said is a significant impediment to the growth of international education in Australia. In late October last year, the coalition government announced it would extend the same offer of streamlined visa processing to some 22 degree-awarding, non-university providers of higher education which present a low immigration risk. This measure is designed to provide equity to schools, technical colleges and other providers of tertiary education to extend Australia's skills set and appeal to overseas students.

The Abbott-Truss government is focused on rebuilding Australia's reputation as a provider of competitive and accessible tertiary education to students from overseas. We acknowledge the need to be welcoming of international students, given the contribution they make to Australia's academic research and advancement as well as to social and economic factors. This is particularly true of Charles Sturt University in my Riverina electorate. Just recently, Wagga Wagga was named as Australia's most family-friendly city, according to Suncorp Bank which analysed employment levels, schools, volunteer workers, health and family income levels. To study at Charles Sturt University is indeed an advantage. Wagga Wagga was at the top of the list of the most family-friendly cities in Australia, ahead of Canberra which came in second, Albury-Wodonga was third, then Toowoomba, Sydney, Hobart, Ballarat, Bendigo, Melbourne, and Mackay was tenth. That is a tremendous thing.

With around 400 courses on offer and 38,000 students worldwide, Charles Sturt University is a highly competitive tertiary institution which is playing its part in the facilitation and training of international students who want to come to Australia to study. CSU is Australia's fifth-largest university and boasts a competitive record in job attainment and retention following graduation. We know many students who study at regional universities then take up residence in those regional areas, which is so important. Charles Sturt University has a proud association with overseas students who are on its campuses at Wagga Wagga, Bathurst, Albury, Orange, Port Macquarie, Sydney, Melbourne, Canberra, and Ontario in Canada.

In total, CSU currently has some 5,410 international students—a great record—with 350 of those spread among university's campuses in regional New South Wales. As well as this, many international students access CSU's courses through distance education right across the globe. The university's most popular distance education course is a Masters of Educational Leadership, which draws candidates from every corner of the world to study through CSU. In 2012, the university indicated it had 113 masters students as part of its distance education program. CSU also has an international campus, which is spreading the university's tremendous reputation through other parts of the world. With a campus in Ontario, Canada, around 40 kilometres south-west of Toronto, the Charles Sturt University Bay Learning Centre in Burlington focuses on the Bachelor of Education and the delivery of other teacher education programs. Beginning in August 2005, the CSU Ontario campus has delivered a qualification to more than 1,100 students and the university has garnered an excellent reputation among students, the local district school boards and the Ontario government. The Ontario campus of CSU has proved to be an important base for the university to build on its distance education program enrolments, particularly in nursing and paramedic training, and we all know how important those two courses are.

The coalition government's plan to extend the offer of streamlined visa processing arrangements to 22 degree-awarding, non-university providers of higher education will provide equity to those international students who want to come to Australia to undertake tertiary study outside of university—and that is so important. These changes will make the vocational sector able to attract more and more international students to undertake qualifications in Australia and to contribute to the ongoing growth of this important part of the Australian economy. As the Minister for Education said on 4 December 2013—

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