Terri Butler (Griffith, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. In the opening that the assistant minister gave because the minister had to yet to arrive, there was an acknowledgement of the 2.8 per cent cut to public funding to universities that was contained in this budget. Part of that is the efficiency dividend of 2½ per cent to the Commonwealth Grant Scheme for the years 2018 and 2019.

As the higher education legislation is written, it appears that universities will continue to be on funding agreements of a one-year duration. If that is the case, it would be appreciated if the minister could advise whether that is considered adequate by the government and why. On the question of the indexation of the CGS payments, I ask that the minister advise what happens to the CGS payments after the efficiency dividend has been taken. Will they return to the 2017 rate or will they be indexed based on the lower 2019 rate? In other words, will there be an overall lowering of the Commonwealth Grants Scheme as a consequence of this so-called efficiency dividend that the government seeks to impose on universities?

A $3.8 billion cut, in fiscal terms, to public funding to higher education—which is a very significant cut and will have an impact not just on the quality of higher education but also on the workforce in higher education—will lead to significant job losses amongst academic and general staff at universities. On top of this, the government intends to take 7½ per cent of public funding to universities and remove it from the CGS, placing it into a separate performance and reward pool. I suggest the minister might have a better chance of answering my questions if he were to listen to them.

An honourable member: That is very generous to the minister but he probably should be listening.

The 7½ per cent reduction in public funding and the removal of that into a performance and reward pool will see universities, if they continue to be on a one-year funding agreement, not know from one year to the next what their revenue will be from government. In other words, 7½ per cent will be contingent on certain performance requirements.

The university sector is completely confused about this because the government has failed to announce what those performance requirements will be for the future years. If you are trying to plan for the future, for your staffing requirements for forthcoming years, not knowing how much the revenue will be makes that a little more difficult. If 7½ per cent of your revenue is contingent on unknown performance indicators, then planning for the future and for future staffing requirements is certainly difficult. Universities are concerned that this will lead to a greater casualisation of their workforces, and I am very concerned about what that will mean for the academic workforce and general staff workforce of the universities of this nation.

Can the minister advise what modelling has been done, if any, on the workforce impact of the 7½ per cent performance and reward pool proposal?

What is expected to happen in terms of allowing universities to engage in long-term planning for their staffing needs given this large contingent component of the higher education funding that is proposed to be introduced?

The member for Newcastle raised concerns about changes to enabling courses, including the removal of the Commonwealth loading and the replacement with a student contribution through HELP, and the tendering of the program to private providers. Unfortunately, the minister, even though he purported to respond to the member for Newcastle's concerns about the University of Newcastle and enabling courses, only took the opportunity to take a bit of a sledge at her about schools. He did not, with any specificity, address the enabling courses changes, which are a matter of great concern to people who are interested in improving the participation in higher education of people from lower socio-economic backgrounds, disadvantaged backgrounds and first-in-family people—people like me who were the first in their family to go to university.

On top of last year's cut to the Higher Education Equity and Partnership Program of $152 million, these changes to enabling courses are going to make even more difficult the attainment of the goal of increasing the representation of people from lower socio-economic backgrounds in higher education and their participation in higher education, and the same goes for people from disadvantaged backgrounds more generally. I would request that the minister answer the questions posed by the member for Newcastle in respect of the enabling courses.

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