Tony Pasin (Barker, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

So much to say, so little time. I will begin by calling this what it is: one hell of a scare campaign. I would love to say I am not a punter, but I am—and I would be prepared to lay odds that the Labor Party have focus-grouped the words 'Americanisation', 'debt sentence' and 'hundred-thousand-dollar degrees'. It would be nice to come into this place and have a mature debate about an important structural reform that this country needs. But that is not what we are getting. In the lead-up to question time, during 90-second statements, the member for Perth came in and talked about a constituent who was already, as a result of the 'changes', modifying the way she was going about her tertiary degree. These are changes that would come into effect, if we legislate them, in 2016!

Because this is a scare campaign, the debate is being reframed by the Labor Party. It is no longer about increasing competition in the tertiary sector. It is not about telling the Australian people that they will not need to pay for their degrees up-front and that they will only be asked to repay the cost of their degree once they are earning over $50,000. It is not a debate about the fact that currently 60 per cent of the Australian population subsidise the 40 per cent to get a tertiary degree to the tune of 60 per cent and that this legislation will recalibrate that to a split of fifty-fifty; but rather, disingenuously, it is a debate about, effectively, free education—a debate that was put to bed in the seventies.

I thought I might just reflect on a once proud leader of the Labor Party, Paul Keating:

There is no such thing, of course, as "free" education. Someone has to pay. In systems with no charges, those somebody's are all taxpayers.

But do not take it from a former leader of the Labor Party; let's take it from a member of the current Labor Party who sits just down there—I suspect he is just outside being subjected to another re-education program—Dr Andrew Leigh:

Australian universities should be free to set student fees according to the market for their degrees. A deregulated or market based HECS will make the student contribution system fairer, because the fees students pay will more closely approximate the value they receive through future earnings.

That is sensible and it is probably the reason why he is being re-educated as we speak!

In the time I have a remaining I want to highlight the benefits to regional students.

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