Dennis Jensen (Tangney, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

You are right; I am joking. Have a look at your opposition leader. He does not look through the newspaper too well, does he? He is not even aware of who the Reserve Bank governor is. The opposition go through the newspaper, sometimes not even realising that a person of one name is actually someone other than who they think, and, ‘Oh, eureka! We’ve got an issue for the day.’ Then they say, ‘We can turn this into an attack on the government. Let’s come up with an MPI.’

We have seen on numerous occasions that Labor simply do not understand the issues. With great excitement, they rush joyously, only to discover that they have all this energy but there is nothing really to show for it. It is a little bit like a can of fizzy drink that is accidentally shaken: a bit of excitement, a slight fizz, then just a mess and a clean-up. Then it is all forgotten. No indelible mark remains.

On this issue, sadly, they think they are onto a winner and that they are going to embarrass the government for having the audacity, of all things, to offer young Australians choice, a choice allowing even more students to undertake courses than are offered under HECS. They have clearly missed the fact that the Howard government has massively increased the number of university places offered under HECS and, in addition, for full fee paying students, and that our government has delivered far more choice to students.

The Labor Party really is opposed to choice. Let’s just have a look at some of the issues. The Labor Party hated the issue of choice in voluntary student unionism. The Labor Party has as its central theme a ‘c’ word which is certainly not associated with the government. The Howard government also has a ‘c’ word at the centre of its policy—that word is ‘choice’. The word most often associated with Labor is ‘compulsion’: compulsion in student unionism, compulsion in unionism generally, compulsion in having to accept wages and conditions under centralised wage-fixing arrangements, and so on.

For Labor, anything not expressly allowed is forbidden. Now, they want to compel Australian students—our future doctors, scientists, lawyers and eventually, in some cases, politicians—to have access only to Commonwealth funded university places. If Australian students want to undertake a certain course at a certain university, even if it means a financial cost, the opposition’s view is that students clearly should not be accorded that option. I repeat: Australian students should not be accorded the option. However, if a student is from foreign shores, it is no holds barred: yep, we’ll have them then. In the view of the opposition we should discriminate against Australian citizens in favour of foreign students.

Perhaps an Australian wanting to do a full-fee course should move overseas. (Quorum formed) Obviously the truth hurts, and as the truth obviously hurts let me reiterate that point: in the view of the opposition they would prefer that we discriminate against Australian citizens in favour of foreign students. Let’s have a look at the logic of their position: an Australian citizen wants to undertake a university degree as a full fee paying student. Under Labor the way they should go about it is go overseas and get foreign citizenship, and, then, hey, we will take the student, but we will not take them while they are an Australian citizen. I am sorry but that does not make any sense at all; that is the undeniable result of Labor’s so-called logic.

Labor’s hypocrisy here knows no bounds. Let’s have a look at a bit of history as far as full fee paying students are concerned. In 1986 under the Hawke government full fee paying foreign students were allowed in. In 1989 Labor allowed in full fee paying postgraduate students. This is clearly a ridiculous position to take. Once again this is an issue of saying, ‘Yep, if they’re a foreign student, it’s acceptable.’ If they are an overseas full fee paying student we will take them but we will not take an Australian citizen.

Let us just think for a second about some of the people who might be disadvantaged by the Labor view. When a certain person by the name of Isaac Newton was 18 years old, he had no ability to do mathematics. They had a plague in England at that time. He retired to the country and taught himself mathematics, and at the age of 22 he invented calculus. Under Labor’s policy, because he would have had inadequate marks to get into a HECS course, Newton would not have been accepted for a full fee paying course; therefore, sorry, folks, Isaac Newton and the whole point of gravity, laws of motion and calculus—gone! Albert Einstein was a low achiever at school. In fact he was referred to by his supervisor as a ‘lazy dog’. Let’s have a look at where Einstein went: photoelectric effects, special relativity and general relativity, at the age of 26. Einstein is another person who would not have been accepted in Australia as a full fee paying student. This is clearly a ludicrous position to take.

The Howard government has introduced a lot of different opportunities for students. In fact our whole attitude is about choice and opportunity. Unfortunately, Labor’s is about compulsion and exclusion—the exclusion, unfortunately, of Australian citizens. Let’s just get that one correct again. Let’s have a look at some of the opportunities afforded to Australian students under the government’s policy. The government has provided more affordable opportunities to students than ever before.

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