Lisa Chesters (Bendigo, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I was the first in my family to go to university. At the time I started my university courses my mother was a cleaner and my father was a mechanic. We were one of those working-class families where my parents decided, 'Our girls will go to university.' But of course they did not have the economic means to support all of us, so we worked and supported ourselves through university. The university I went to—I grew up in a regional area and I moved from the country to the city—was the University of Queensland, which is in the member for Ryan's electorate. I can remember when I first enrolled and started at university in 1999. The big debate back then was about the Howard government reforms to higher education.

Every time the Liberals and the coalition get elected they attack universities. They attack students who choose to go to universities and they look at increasing fees. At that time, Howard, as bold as he was, tripled HECS fees. But he did not proceed with completely deregulating university fees. At the time, he cut university funding, but not at the level that this current government is cutting funding at. At the time, he tried to introduce—and he did successfully, after many battles—up-front fees. What we saw at the University of Queensland and Melbourne University with the introduction of up-front fees, where it was not about your brains but about your wallet, was the introduction of $100,000 degrees. So to sit there and say it is not going to happen is being delusional because it did happen the last time the Liberals had the power.

This is what Liberals do when they get in. They do not consider seriously the implications for people from regional areas trying to gain a university education. The Abbott government's first budget marks the end of a fair and affordable higher education system, and it is a betrayal to students and their families. This budget is forcing young people to make a choice and forcing their families to make a choice. Will they choose to go to university or will they buy their first home? This is not just about the working-class families. This is also about the middle-class families. Parents will start to ask themselves whether they can afford to support their students and pay for their young people to go to private schools. Will they save that money to pay for their universities? Start to think about what happens throughout the education system if your university fees will be the cost of a private school education in some schools.

Low-income earners, rural students and regional students will all be hit hard by these changes. More than $5 billion have been cut from higher education, and it is not okay. This is not something we are just making up and scaremongering about. This is something that people in our communities know about. Just some of the comments that I have received in my regional electorate of Bendigo include this one from Rozi in Kyneton:

I am not writing out of self-interest—I've finished my university education.

I am writing because I am concerned that these policies will create a two-class system in our universities and make it impossible to go to better universities if their parents are not wealthy.

This is from Rachael, a Latrobe University current student:

I am writing on behalf of myself and a group of my friends who have just started university ...

We are aged from 18-22 and are all completely outraged at Tony Abbott's proposed cuts to education.

Rachel says she and her friends worry about their brothers and sisters who are younger, and that they may not go to university because of the comparative cost of their fees. She goes on:

Most of us were already concerned about the debt our courses would accrue, but some of my friends have talked of dropping out if Abbott gets his appalling education budget through.

These are not my words. These are the words of my community.

Ms Scott interjecting—

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