Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Women's Issues) Share this | Hansard source

The Australian government has lifted the cap on full-fee-paying places. As the member would be aware, that cap was 35 per cent in most subjects and 25 per cent in medicine, and that has been lifted. But the fact is that about three per cent of full-fee-paying undergraduate domestic places are currently in existence. So we do not have any anticipation that that will increase dramatically. The cap was essentially lifted because it was an unnecessary piece of bureaucracy that did not need to be there.

We have made it a requirement that the universities must continue to offer Commonwealth supported places and we will not allow universities to manipulate the provision of Commonwealth supported places to fill courses with full-fee-paying places. The way we will be able to do that is through the three-year funding agreements that are also a budget initiative from this year. Universities will be required to offer all Commonwealth-supported places, and we will not allow them to manipulate those places so as to create full-fee-paying courses.

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