Darren Chester (Gippsland, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

by leave—It is a pleasure to follow the Chair of the Standing Committee on Petitions. I congratulate the member for Fowler on the excellent work she is doing—and you too of course, Mr Deputy Speaker Adams—with the committee.

I rise to present a petition approved by the Standing Committee on Petitions. This petition is in direct response to the Rudd government’s flawed decision to change the eligibility criteria for students seeking to access the independent rate of youth allowance.

I join with the petitioners in highlighting the simple fact that these changes to the youth allowance place another barrier to university participation for students in regional areas. They unfairly discriminate against students currently undertaking their gap here and contradict other efforts to increase university participation by students from rural and regional Australia.

The petition currently contains 206 signatures, but let me assure the House that such is the depth of concern over this issue there are many more on the way. My office has sent a further 2,000 signatures to the Petitions Committee this week and I have been inundated with emails and letters from concerned teachers and parents, and of course the students themselves.

And on that point I will take up comments from the Minister for Education who has responded to questions in this place by claiming that the opposition is merely scaremongering on the issue. The minister also said it was a ‘very silly question’ when I asked the minister to guarantee that the students currently on their gap year would not be financially penalised under the government’s changes. The petitioners who have already supported this petition before the House tonight—and those who have written letters or sent emails, all of which I am forwarding to the minister directly—are not being silly, nor are they scaremongering. I know the minister is particularly busy, but I urge the minister to stop playing politics with the hopes and aspirations of country students and take the time to read at least some of the letters from students, parents and educators in Gippsland and throughout Australia.

Just by way of example, let me quote from a media release distributed by the Baw Baw Latrobe Local Learning and Employment Network on 22 May. The CEO, Mick Murphy—a man who is also not in the habit of saying silly things or scaremongering—said:

This policy discriminates against rural and regional students and has taken a city-centric view of further education.

We also have the Isolated Children’s Parents Association offering some forthright comments in a media release on 20 May titled ‘Rudd giveth—Rudd taketh away’.

Dick Adams (Lyons, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I remind the honourable member that his comments, I believe, are to the statement that petitions be tabled.

Darren Chester (Gippsland, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. The association remarks in support of petitioners:

The move to a single criterion—

as referred to in the petition—

for qualifying for independent youth allowance of 30 hours a week work for at least 18 months in a two-year period will have huge negative impact on students from rural and remote areas. Finding part-time work for 15 hours a week in small country towns is difficult enough but 30 hours a week is even tougher to do.

I do not believe that the petitioners are silly people or scaremongers. I believe they are concerned that the government is making it harder for country children to achieve their full potential. Students themselves in addition to signing a petition have written to me directly seeking my intervention and urging me as the member for Gippsland to encourage the government to change its position. I have been receiving letters from people such as Leigh Rogers who said:

I have been blindsided by the Labor Party’s new budget and the scheme has been ripped from under me without any warning.

Parents such as Les and Janice Barnett in Bairnsdale have also signed a petition. They said:

This change will put university beyond the reach of many rural students. It also places extra stresses on the students especially those who have taken this year off in good faith expecting to be eligible for the allowance in 2010.

There is a moral argument there that is put by the petitioners that these students have acted in good faith, that they followed the rules as they applied at the end of 2008 and deferred their studies to work hard and qualify for the independent rate of youth allowance. I urge regional MPs on the government benches to make the point, on behalf of their constituents, that this particular policy direction is actively discriminating against regional students.

I offer the petitioners some comfort that this petition will be circulated more widely throughout the community of Gippsland in the weeks ahead. I urge people who are interested to follow this process. As the Chair of the Standing Committee on Petitions has referred to already tonight, the opportunity to put their views to the people’s parliament is a critical part of our democracy and it has given me great pleasure to be a part of the Petitions Committee and to participate in the debate on behalf of my constituents.

The Petitions Committee, under the member for Fowler, including you yourself, Mr Deputy Speaker, has had many active discussions in recent times. The committee has seen some very successful campaigns conducted by residents right throughout Australia, and I urge the Minister for Education to consider the weight of this petition very highly. I know that similar petitions are being circulated right throughout regional Australia at the moment.

I will give the last word in this discussion tonight to a student who attended the Gippsland Grammar School in Sale last year. The Minister for Finance and Deregulation himself may be interested, as this was his former school. Another alumnus is a former school captain Monique Lawless, who is working hard to overturn this decision and is actively circulating the petition on behalf of her colleagues. Monique wrote to me to highlight her concerns:

I had no choice but to move away from home in order to further my education, but did not want this to be a burden on my family. Students like myself who have made a commitment to meeting the independence criteria before heading off to university have been left high and dry.

This is not silly. It is not scaremongering. It is about country people standing up for a fair go, and I urge the minister to reconsider the decision.

The petition read as follows—

To the Honourable The Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives.

This petition of members from the Gippsland community recognises the importance of providing affordable access to university for students from rural and regional areas.

Members of the Gippsland community draw the attention of the House to changes announced in the Federal Budget on May 12, 2009 which states that students will no longer be able to achieve financial independence for Youth Allowance and ABSTUDY by meeting the 2nd and 3rd elements of the workforce criterion.

The petitioners believe that the Youth Allowance changes proposed in the Federal Budget place another barrier to university participation for students in regional areas; unfairly discriminate against students currently undertaking a ‘gap’ year; and contradict other efforts to increase university participation by students from rural and regional Australia.

We therefore ask the House to retain the 2nd and 3rd elements of the workforce criterion so that a tertiary education is accessible to regional students.

from 206 citizens

Petition received.

Dick Adams (Lyons, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The time for statements has elapsed.