Senate debates

Wednesday, 7 October 2020

Bills

Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020; Second Reading

10:39 am

Photo of Nita GreenNita Green (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020. That's quite the title, isn't it! As we know with bills from this government, the title of this bill is all about marketing and spin. It doesn't even come close to reflecting the reality of what this legislation will do—or, to be more frank, what this legislation won't do. The government has said that this legislation is necessary and that it will do certain things, but once we have a look at the practical implication of this very important legislation, it is very clear that it will not achieve what it is setting out to do.

The bill will not make uni graduates more job ready, nor will it support most regional and remote students, because there's always an asterisk on the end of what this government says it's going to do. There's always a caveat. What this bill says to students is that you can have a go if you can pay through the nose for your degree. You can have a go if your parents can afford to help you pay for your fees upfront. You can have a go but only if you study what we want you to study. You can have a go, but absolutely do not make a mistake or get it wrong in that first year. This isn't a bill to get uni graduates into a job. This is a bill which will cut funding, jack up fees and lock students out. At a time when youth unemployment is at a record high, especially in regional Queensland, this bill won't do what it says it will do. It will just make it harder and more expensive for students to go to uni.

Right now we know universities are hurting. This government is no friend to universities. Universities missed out on JobKeeper because the government changed the rules twice to keep them out of that scheme. As a result, we have seen job losses around the country at universities, including in regional Queensland, where we have seen more than 300 job losses from the Central Queensland University in Rockhampton. Scott Morrison has done nothing to stop these job losses in our fourth-largest export industry. He's shown no interest in the thousands of university staff losing their livelihoods or the community that depend on these jobs. Instead, he's bringing this legislation in here, trying to tell people in regional areas that this will help. Well, we know that it won't.

This bill is a slap in the face to students who want to study in regional centres across the country. Regional universities will be paid less to do more. Whether you're a student studying in Cairns, Townsville or Mackay, this government is offering a raw deal for kids, who might be the first one in their family to go to university. It really doesn't matter how many times government senators come in here and read from the talking points on this legislation, because what we know is this: under the package, nearly twice as many regional and remote students will be forced to pay the highest rate of student fees. Regional universities deliver a higher proportion of courses that will have their funding cut compared to non-regional universities. We know that. No amount of spin can undo that fact. These universities will get less to do more, with cuts to guaranteed funding of about $1 billion a year. The Commonwealth's contribution towards uni funding will drop from 58 per cent to 51 per cent, forcing students to carry 49 per cent of the load of their course fee. The bill won't do what it says it is going to do. It will not help regional students. It won't make young people more job ready. It will make studying more expensive.

When the so-called Job-ready Graduates Package was announced by Minister Tehan, there were a number of claims made which just do not stack up to scrutiny. It has quickly become apparent that the minister's assumptions were based on ideology rather than fact. Humanities graduates are just as in demand as maths and science graduates, and experts have found that price signals will not deter students from their preferred field of study. What the government's proposal does instead is saddle students with an increasing debt burden, with the average student paying seven per cent more for their degree at a time of economic crisis—unbelievable!

The government would have you believe that the reason they're doing this is that we need more skills in key areas, but the government—this government—are the reason that we have a skills crisis in regional Australia. The government have defunded TAFE and failed apprentices. This is their skills crisis, but now they're blaming students for choosing the wrong degrees. And they go one step further than this: they want to punish students who struggle in their first year. I draw the Senate's attention to these comments made by CQUniversity in their submission to the Senate inquiry on this bill:

Students lead complex lives. Within CQUniversity's student profile, most are working, and many are supporting partners and parents, and as such this aspect of the proposed legislation is potentially extremely limiting and inequitable for them.

That is what a regional university is saying about this proposal.

This is particularly prevalent—

they said—

for those students who come from underrepresented or disadvantaged backgrounds, including low socioeconomic, regional, rural and remote and Indigenous students. Given one intent of the Job Ready Graduates package is to increase Indigenous student participation rates in Higher Education through the introduction of a demand-driven funding allocation, this amendment seems counterproductive and detrimental to their overall success.

That is what regional universities are saying about this proposal, but what are regional students saying? We don't hear a lot of their voices in speeches from government senators. Unlike members of the government, I've taken the time to listen to students and other young people who will be directly affected by this regressive proposal. If every senator did the same thing, they would not be supporting this bill.

Students in regional Queensland feel anxious, unsupported and left behind by these plans and they fear what the Liberal-National coalition has in store for them. Emily studies marine biology at JCU in Townsville. She hit the nail on the head when describing how this proposal would impact poorer students. She told me that Townsville students are already struggling under this economic crisis. They're struggling so much financially that they are relying on a food pantry at the university just to afford groceries. That is the situation that these regional students are in. Emily said, 'Not only is this government attacking higher education but they're cutting student income support, plunging many students back into poverty. Most regional students come from low socioeconomic backgrounds and don't have that financial safety net. If they do have a tough semester, their parents can't support them into continuing that education.'

I listened to many students during this process to understand their stories and to tell their stories today, and I want to thank them for sharing their stories, but now I want to share my story. I was the first person in my family to go to university. I was lucky that I had a parent who told me that if I worked hard I could do what I wanted, achieve anything I wanted. I spoke publicly, in my first speech, about the struggles of growing up in the home that I grew up in. In that home I knew instinctively that I needed to work hard and study hard so I could secure my own future, so I could take care of my parents when I had the chance and so that if I ever had children I would be able to give them more than I had. I worked hard to get my chance but I still couldn't afford to go straight to university—that was beyond me—so I did a traineeship in the year after school and I saved my money. I applied for scholarships, anything that I could possibly get, so I could finally achieve this dream. I moved away from home so I could go to university and study what I wanted, which was arts and humanities. I didn't study the course because I didn't want to get a job—I wanted a job more than anything in the world; I wanted a career—but it was what I was good at, and I knew that the degree would actually make me job-ready for a huge range of industries. This idea that humanities and arts students aren't employable is absolute rubbish.

The first year of university was not easy. It was hard to adjust, but I found my feet. I studied. I worked hard. There were ups and downs. I went back at night to study during the GFC when I lost my job. Under this bill, thinking about the huge debt that I might have had to pay off, thinking about the possibility of losing access to support if I made a mistake in the first year, that would have made me think twice about studying. It wouldn't have made me think twice about studying another area; it would have made me think twice about studying altogether, and maybe I wouldn't have studied at university at all. I wouldn't have got that chance. Australia should be a country where kids are able to study—a traineeship, an apprenticeship, a university degree—no matter what they want to study or who their parents are: if their mum is a nurse, like mine, or a doctor or a teacher or a bus driver. It should not matter how much money your parents have, but under this bill it will.

Australia was that country under Labor. That's why I got the chance to go to university, to step out of the cycle, to build a life for myself. But under this Liberal-National government I would not have stood a chance. It wasn't my fault, and it wasn't my mum's fault that she chose safety over financial security. Kids should not be punished for coming from a family where they need to work harder to get that chance and they should not be deterred, but under this bill this is exactly what will happen: kids from single-parent families will be deterred from studying. I wouldn't have got my chance.

Ultimately, whether this bill passes or fails will hinge on how the crossbench votes. Sadly, we have seen One Nation sell out young people in regional centres like Rockhampton and Mackay by agreeing to support this bill. It is unsurprising but it is still incredibly disappointing. The crossbench should vote against this bill. I applaud Senator Lambie for publicly coming out against this bill. My message to Centre Alliance and any other senators who are planning on supporting this legislation is to listen to what young people are saying and oppose this bill. Grow a spine and do the right thing. Don't fall for this marketing and spin.

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