Louise Pratt (WA, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Manufacturing) Share this | Hansard source

Today Labor supports the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency Amendment (Prohibiting Academic Cheating Services) Bill 2019 and the introduction of deterrents to academic cheating services in Australia's higher education system. The bill before us implements recommendations made by the Higher Education Standards Panel. That panel concluded that inadequately constrained cheating activity 'has the potential to cause great damage to the domestic and international reputation of Australian higher education.' Unfortunately no Australian jurisdiction currently has offences aimed specifically at deterring or punishing organised cheating services. We know that the higher education sector is critically important to Australia, and Labor will always support legislation that defends the sector's integrity.

The bill before us makes it an offence to provide, offer to provide or arrange for a third person to provide an academic cheating service to a student undertaking a higher education course in Australia. Commercial services will face both commercial and civil penalties, while services not operating commercially will face civil penalties. It also makes it an offence to publish or broadcast an advertisement for one of these cheating services, and you'll see this in proposed section 114B. We have expressed some concerns about the design of this offence and we will talk through them now. A person prosecuted for publishing an advertisement for an academic cheating service operating for a commercial purpose could face a potential jail term, even if they are receiving no personal gain. The concern among Labor is that this provision could unintentionally capture vulnerable students who are simply forwarding or sharing electronically an advertisement for commercial services. It could easily be disguised as something more innocent, and the student may not be aware of exactly what they're sharing. It could be advertised as some kind of academic support service, whereas embedded in it is in fact a cheating service.

As the explanatory memorandum acknowledges, these can be persuasive and sophisticated operations. These operations are aimed at vulnerable people and they often try to portray themselves as being altruistic. We have alerted the minister to these serious concerns, and an addendum to the explanatory memorandum has indeed been tabled by the minister in the House. This addendum makes clear that the circumstances about which Labor is concerned are not intended to be caught by this legislation.

So, as I said, we very strongly support the deterrence measures for academic cheating services. But we also want to make sure that the legislation does not implicate vulnerable students who have received no personal benefit from their unintended actions. Cheating services are very well known to target vulnerable students as part of their business model. Indeed, there are a great many vulnerable students in our nation at the moment. We've got students who are away from home and family and are separated from their usual support systems and they can, as we know, be particularly vulnerable to rogue services like these. We know that the reputation of the sector is vitally important, and unfortunately our reputation has copped a severe battering among international students this year. Sadly, we've seen international students lined up around the block, desperate for a free meal, with no support from this federal government. What are these people going to tell their friends and families about Australia when they get home, with all of the pressure that is upon them to get good marks and pass as well as be able to support themselves while they are here?

We're talking about an industry that provides Australia with some of its most significant export income. It provides huge value to our nation's regional communities, and it is a sector that is absolutely critical to our nation's ongoing economic prosperity. But we have a government that is absolutely throwing this critical sector under the bus. We should be a nation that knows that Australian universities are good for all of us. The minister acknowledged himself that productivity improvements in the sector can increase economic growth by some $2.7 billion a year. However, we have a government that is now sitting by and watching as universities shed jobs, close campuses and cut back on courses and degrees. We have a government that has gone out of its way to exclude universities from COVID support. We have a government that has repeatedly changed its policy to stop uni staff from accessing wage subsidies. Hundreds of university jobs in our country have already gone. Campuses have closed, and thousands more jobs are at risk.

But, most unfortunately, this is just the beginning of a sector-wide crisis. The impact of these losses on our nation's regional communities will be devastating. Universities support some 14,000 jobs in country Australia and help underpin the economy in countless towns. Across the board we are looking at tens of thousands of livelihoods being destroyed. Here we are talking about academics, tutors, admin staff, library staff, catering staff, ground staff, cleaners, security and so many others—all people with families, with bills to pay and with commitments to meet. This government has gone out of its way to exclude these workers from JobKeeper, and I am extremely alarmed at the Prime Minister's determination to abandon them. Why have this government and this Prime Minister been so determined to abandon these workers? To me, it seems like a deliberate attack on Australian higher education.

The government's Job-Ready Graduates Package will just make things worse for universities. Under this package the sector will face an overall cut of almost $1 billion a year in government funding. So much for job-ready graduate support. For students this package means it will be harder and more expensive to go to Australia's universities. This has never been Labor's approach and it never will be our approach. Under Labor we saw a boost in investment from $8 billion in 2007 to $14 billion in 2013. We opened up the system, uncapped places and gave an additional 190,000 students a spot at university. Labor's decisions were driven by our commitment to improving Australia's productivity and by our commitment to breaking down disadvantage and inequality in our education system. Indeed, it has succeeded. It succeeded in bringing new people to university; Indigenous enrolments are up and more Australians with disability entered the system, as did people from regional and remote areas.

Education has helped create jobs, higher wages and a better quality of life for all Australians. These are the issues and guiding principles that should be at the heart of Australian education policy. It should be a vision of equity and productivity that is funded and supported with strong resources. Unfortunately, this is not a vision that is shared by this government, which is watching thousands of jobs go in the higher education sector. It is watching campuses close. It is making it harder and more expensive for students to go to university. So, while we have this legislation before the chamber, in relation to academic cheating, I would really like to draw the government's attention to the bigger picture of the state of Australia's higher education institutions for Australian students and for international students.