Tony Zappia (Makin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Manufacturing) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Abbott government's unfair changes to university funding will result in university fees of $100,000 and will hit lower-income households the hardest. Cutting $5.8 billion from Australian universities and then deregulating them is nothing less than backdoor taxation, which will be paid for by university students or by their families. If the Abbott government thinks that the changes are fair and reasonable, if they will result in greater access to university, and if more students will go to university, then why didn't the Abbott government tell Australians about the proposed changes before the last federal election? No matter how much the education minister tries to spin it, higher education fees, compounded by higher interest rates, will stop many young people, particularly those from low-income households and from regional Australia, from ever going to university. Rather than desperately working on backroom deals with senators to get its higher education changes through the parliament, the Abbott government should admit it is wrong, do what smart governments do, make university education more accessible, not less, and drop its unfair higher education changes.