Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Women's Issues) Share this | Hansard source

A 50 per cent increase, Member for Paterson. Students are reporting the highest levels of satisfaction ever. The median starting salary for graduates is $40,000. That is nearly 82 per cent of average weekly earnings. Among those graduates available for full-time work, nearly 94 per cent were in some form of employment within four months of leaving university. About 81 per cent of graduates are in full-time employment and 12 per cent are in casual part-time employment while looking for full-time work. Graduate satisfaction is at a record high of about 90 per cent.

Since the Higher Education Contribution Scheme was introduced by the Labor Party in 1989—they introduced HECS—over two million individuals have been able to access higher education through Australian government funded loans. About $17 billion has been loaned to students since 1989. Almost $7 billion has been repaid. About 830,000 people have totally repaid their HECS debt. Of those who have not, around 20 per cent of them never will—they will effectively have a free degree because they will not reach the income threshold at which repayment kicks in, at just over $38,000.

Today the average outstanding HECS debt is $10,500, yet the member for Jagajaga is out there trying to tell students that they have to pay $240,000 to do a university degree. She is suggesting they have to choose between a house and a university degree. That is ridiculous. It is scaremongering and exaggeration. She ought to be ashamed.

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