Mehreen Faruqi (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

The higher education sector is in crisis. Inquiry after inquiry, report after report, tell the same story, over and over, of the complete failures of a neo-liberal agenda and the corporatisation, the consultant capture and the commercialisation of universities, where the public focused knowledge creation, teaching and research mission of universities has given way to the commodification and marketisation of pubic higher education, to the utter detriment of staff, students and public education.

An Australian Tertiary Education Commission, or ATEC, as envisaged by the accord, has the potential to provide stability and stewardship to the higher education sector. However, the proposal in this bill requires significant changes. The Greens have secured a number of amendments to the bill that will improved ATEC's ability to confront the significant challenges facing the higher education system.

One of the issues with the bill is that it fails to even recognise the public mission of universities. Universities should be places that advance the public good through learning, teaching and research. They should be places to seek knowledge, to research, to debate and for discussion and be places that support the social, civic and educational basis of a society. They should not simply become job factories that churn out graduates.

Another issue raised, nearly unanimously, by stakeholders in the Senate inquiry is the lack of independence of the proposed ATEC. The ATEC must have the teeth and the remit to genuinely guide a sector in crisis with independence. It must be able to do its work frankly and fearlessly. Otherwise, it's just an administrative exercise and risks merely duplicating the Department of Education.

We all know that research is a core function of our higher education system that contributes to the public good by advancing knowledge, technology and society. But this bill has a lack of focus on research, and that is a concern. It will be addressed through Greens amendments, which put research front and centre of the ATEC's mission. The bill abolishes the Higher Education Standards Panel, which currently sits under TEQSA, and provides independent advice on the Higher Education Standards Framework. A Greens amendment will ensure that the functions of the Higher Education Standards Panel, or HESP, and its expertise are transferred to the ATEC—that this function and its expertise don't get lost.

In order to fulfil the public mission of higher education, universities and their leadership must represent the communities that they serve, and they must confront the legacies of imperialism and racism. All campuses must be actively anti-racist, but, unfortunately, we are far from this.

Possibly the most significant concern in this bill is that while it will, perhaps, be Minister Clare's signature reform it neglects to address the punitive Job-ready Graduate scheme, fee hikes and funding cuts—one of the major challenges facing higher education. This policy is responsible for students paying more and more—paying $50,000 for arts degrees—and getting crushed under higher and higher debt. It is this policy that is stopping people from studying what they love. It is this policy that is creating the biggest inequities and unfairness in the higher education system.

When in opposition, Labor called the JRG package 'an act of economic and cultural vandalism'. Given all of this hot air, Prime Minister Albanese should have dumped Morrison's job-ready graduates' fee hikes the second Labor came into power. Instead, we are four years into the Albanese government and today we have another higher education bill but still no change. Labor really is all talk and very little action. They won't even allow the ATEC to give them advice on student contributions, because they know exactly what that advice will say, and this government doesn't want to hear it.

Before politics, I worked in the university sector as an academic and as a researcher. That was my dream job. That was my passion. My passion for higher education has not dimmed one bit since I have come into this place, and it has been personally devastating for me to see the sector get smashed over and over. The Australian Tertiary Education Commission won't fix it all, but the Greens recognise its potential to provide guidance, stability and stewardship to a sector in crisis.

We are pleased that Labor has agreed to many of our amendments to this bill, which will help ensure that the ATEC will be more effective in fulfilling its role, but we are deeply concerned by the government's refusal to ensure that the ATEC examines contributions and actually scrap the JRG. The longer JRG remains, the more students are punished and the more inequitable our higher education system becomes.