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

This was meant to be Labor's year of big ideas. Instead, we see instalment after instalment in Labor's concerted campaign to frighten the Australian people back into poverty. It is not enough that they want to trash the transformative impacts of the China-Australia Free Trade Agreement. They also want to put reform of the tertiary education sector into reverse. Unlike those opposite, the coalition government has made a commitment to the Australian people that we will seize the opportunities of the 21st century, including export opportunities in the tertiary education sector.

Reform in this sector is absolutely essential if we are to see the substantial economic and educational opportunities that lie ahead of our nation in the 21st century. Not only do those opposite put at risk the competitiveness of our national universities, but they also put at risk the very viability of our higher education system. Australia's tertiary education sector is a fundamental pillar of Australia's economy and export industries.

Given that we are talking this week about the Trans-Pacific Partnership, I think it is really important that we focus on that export capacity. We have to stop making this argument, centred squarely in the 1970s and 1980s, and bring forward reforms to this sector, in a bipartisan way. Whilst we debate university reform, the tertiary education sector is left, unfortunately, to languish without the tools needed to remain globally competitive.

In terms of the reform that we were prosecuting, the thing that I found particularly important—and this might be relevant to the member for Richmond, given her criticism of country members on this side of the place—is the Commonwealth Scholarships scheme. This was particularly important to me in my electorate, because when I was travelling around my electorate I would hear day to day from parents and students who came from regional areas that the biggest barrier for them in going to university had absolutely nothing to do with fees. After all, we have the Higher Education Loan Program, or HECS as it was called. The biggest barrier, and this might come as a surprise to the member for Richmond, was the cost of picking up, leaving home and getting accommodation in Adelaide, Sydney, Melbourne, or Canberra. That is where the real barrier was, and that is where the Commonwealth Scholarships were going to assist rural students. But, unfortunately, we did not see the academic honesty on the other side of the House to be able to acknowledge that significant step forward towards the appropriate reform agenda.

I could also talk about sub-bachelor degrees and how these can be paid for. The James Morrison Academy of Music, in Mount Gambier, is a classic example of opportunities being provided to students in a sub-bachelor framework. Those opposite will not concede this and do not want to concede it, because all they say is their misinformation about $100,000 degrees. The idea that students, who will over the course of their lifetime earn $1 million more than those not undertaking or attaining university or tertiary qualifications, should not pay their fair share is a ludicrous slap in the face for the majority of Australians, who are not receiving and will not receive a university education. I heard that every day in my electorate, and it is a fair submission that has been made to me and others in this campaign.

You can tell that this is a fear campaign, a campaign of misinformation, if you take the opportunity to consider that part of the university that is already deregulated. Let us look at postgraduate degrees and at international students. Those opposite, who want to talk about $100,000 degrees and want to live in that globe of fear will not say to you, 'Look, postgraduate degrees are between $10,000 and $30,000 in this country.' International qualifications are similar. They will not speak about that. Instead, it is disappointing that what they want to do is frighten the Australian people all the way back to poverty. It is a campaign we have heard a lot about and I think we will hear more about it in the lead-up to the next election. Shame on them.

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