Larissa Waters (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

It's still too low, I'm afraid. It is still about one quarter. That is not good enough. Do better! Maybe if there were more women around the cabinet table we wouldn't see such a terrible policy as this one, which will disproportionately affect women once again. About two-thirds of the students in the fields of humanities, social sciences, and media and comms are women. The yearly fees in those courses are set to more than double. They're just shy of $7,000 at the minute; they're set to go up $14,500. My colleague Senator Faruqi, who has our portfolio responsibilities on this matter, also mentioned a very interesting statistic: the fee increase will again be disproportionately borne by women. Should this bill pass, women will pay, on average, 10 per cent more for fees, whereas the blokes will pay only an extra six per cent. We don't think anyone should be paying more, because we think universities should be free, but there is absolutely no case for women to be bearing the brunt of increased university fees. We women already take longer to pay off our HECS debts thanks to the facts that we're still paid lower wages and we often have to take time out of the workforce for caring responsibilities, which we disproportionately bear the unpaid brunt of. Doubling the cost of humanities and comms degrees will push women further into debt and lead to even more long-term economic insecurity.

We know that the additional debt burden just compounds the systemic disadvantage that flows from the gender pay gap, but this government either hasn't thought about that or does not care. This whole pandemic has disproportionately affected women, the bill before us will disproportionately affect women, yet we still don't have a women's budget impact statement and we still don't have enough women around the cabinet table making these sorts of decisions. So it's no surprise that once again we have a bill that's completely blind to or doesn't address the disproportionately negative impacts on women.

Interestingly, some other female-dominated degrees, including teaching and nursing, will cost less under these changes. However, these industries are already highly feminised, and it won't surprise anyone that they are amongst the lowest paid. Those two concepts are, sadly, linked. In fact, nursing has also been the highest-risk profession in the year we have just had. Those sectors have been subject to public sector pay freezes and casualisation and, of course, they've been largely ignored in the COVID stimulus packages. Lower fees to encourage women into lower-paid, undervalued professions is not good policy.

The minister has argued that the proposed changes could advance gender equality by prompting more young women to study STEM, because of the cheaper university fees for STEM. However, that flies in the face of evidence that financial incentives alone repeatedly fail to achieve gender equality in STEM. If we really want more women and girls in STEM then we need some serious investment in that sector. We need to challenge the gender bias that, sadly, still persists in that sector and in so many others. We need to look at the way in which young women are encouraged to study STEM at school—look at the role models that they have, look at the teachers, look at the gender composition of that mentoring—and destigmatise flexible working conditions in institutions that practise STEM.

Finally, the proposal to remove HECS support from people who fail their subjects also will have an immensely gendered impact. This government is saying that if you fail more than half of your subjects you'll be cut off from your HECS and HELP support. Sadly, we know—because we pay attention and we talk to young women and we talk to university students and workers—that many women who have been subject to sexual harassment, rape or assault on campus will fail many of their subjects in that semester. That is understandable; they have been traumatised, and they are often very much let down by the university system in grappling with those assaults. Yet this government has not factored that in. It hasn't factored in the burden that young people bear, the juggling exercise they have to undertake to even afford to go to university. Many of them are working in jobs and have carer responsibilities. Again, this government is blind to the realities of life as a young person and as a woman; so it's no surprise that this package will have a disproportionate effect on women.

I'm from Queensland. There will be some extremely poor outcomes for some of our universities in Queensland. The University of the Sunshine Coast will lose $31 million per year, more than any other university. James Cook University, up in North Queensland, will lose $6 million a year. Central Queensland University, in Rocky, and Griffith University have also opposed the changes in this bill.

The Greens stand with students. We stand with those universities that are saying, 'We would like more funding, rather than less; we're spread quite thinly as it is, thank you very much.' We stand with investing in a prosperous and bright future for young people, for anyone who wants to go back to uni and study a new skill, for anyone who needs to retrain as our economy changes. Yes, we are in a global health pandemic; but we are also in a climate crisis and there will need to be some retraining and reskilling of workers as industries change and adapt to our climate collapse. That's another reason why we think university should be free. Tertiary education, in all its forms, including TAFE, should be free.

Unfortunately, it looks like we've just lost the numbers. That's why we're debating this bill here today—because the government has finally got Centre Alliance to vote to cut university funding. It has given them a few crumbs from the table for South Australia. The reality of the balance of power shows itself once again in a poor decision that will be rammed through this chamber because the government has managed to bribe enough support out of the crossbench to get them to support it. I commend Senators Lambie and Patrick for standing with the opposition and with the Greens to oppose this bill. We're extremely disappointed that Centre Alliance—I think we are calling them Liberal Alliance now—have decided to stand with the Liberals and slash funding for universities nationally just to get a few crumbs from the table for South Australia. My South Australian colleague, Senator Hanson-Young, will be saying some considered words about this very issue later in the debate.

We have a government that has never met a young person, doesn't think much about women and doesn't value tertiary education—and they are ramming this bill through, right before the budget, after successive cuts to our university sector already and after refusing to support university staff with JobKeeper eligibility. They are shameless. Let's turf them out next time.