Stephen Smith (Perth, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Education and Training) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Higher Education Legislation Amendment (2007 Measures No. 1) Bill 2007. Labor does not oppose this bill, and Labor will not seek to prevent its passage through the parliament. Labor, however, is very critical of aspects of it and questioning or sceptical about others. The bill before us this evening does a number of things. These include: revising the maximum funding amounts provided under the Higher Education Support Act 2003 to provide funding to support the implantation of the government’s so-called research quality framework, or RQF; and amending the Higher Education Support Act to reflect changes to the National Protocols for Higher Education Approval Processes. The national protocols regulate the recognition of new universities, the operation of overseas universities in Australia and the accreditation of courses offered by higher education institutions.

The protocols were first approved by the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs in 2000, introducing a number of measures relating to the administration of the Higher Education Loan Program, or HELP, and arrangements for Commonwealth support of students; amending the Higher Education Support Act 2003, the Higher Education Funding Act 1988 and the Higher Education Support (Transitional Provisions and Consequential Amendments) Act 2003 to limit the time students can claim an entitlement to Commonwealth support; and making a number of minor amendments intended to improve the operation of the Higher Education Support Act. Most contentiously, the legislation amends the Higher Education Support Act to ensure universities can gain access to funding for the government’s so-called research quality framework, the RQF.

Labor has previously expressed very grave reservations about the RQF. Let me detail some of those reservations, which have been placed on the record. In Labor’s higher education white paper published last year, at page 38 it says:

The Government is considering a ‘research quality framework’ in an effort to obtain qualitative information about Australian university research and its ‘impact’. The Expert Advisory Group for the Government’s Research Quality Framework has used the British Research Assessment Exercise (RAE), an approach to research quality assessment about to be abandoned in the UK, as the basis for an Australian model.

The current proposal for an Australian version of the RAE has itself been assessed as ‘fundamentally flawed, both in design and operation’.

It is seen to suffer four major deficiencies:

i. research output is not the direct object of quality assessment;

ii. the assessment panels are too thin to do the job credibly;

iii. the assessments lack output volume measures;

iv. the approach to the assessment of ‘impact’ is too underdeveloped to be included.

The lack of independent, external evaluation of the quality and impact of Australian research is problematic. Investment cannot be well directed when it is not well informed. The community cannot be confident that its investment is worthwhile without evidence that it is.

My colleague the shadow minister for science, Senator Carr, on 7 February in an address said he had:

... concerns about the Howard government’s RQF that it wants to impose on universities.

A major issue is the proposed ‘impact’ measure. This is untried internationally: there are no accepted international standards, no comparable international data; no internationally accepted, rigorous processes in place.

In particular, while it might be argued that it is clear how ‘research impact’ might be measured in the Sciences, it’s far from clear that this can be done at all in the Humanities and the Arts.

I want to see a system based on peer review, that is internationally credible.

I will look at the British Research Assessment Exercise, the RAE, and the changes to be proposed by Gordon Brown. I will investigate ways in which we can adopt a quantitative set of research quality measures, based on verifiable indices.

Another big concern is the cost and other resources that will need to be tied up in the assessment and reporting processes. As some have pointed out ... the process will be hugely resource-intensive, considering how much funding will be moved around and allocated by means of it.

…            …            …

Labor is reviewing the current RQF exercise. We want a research quality assurance system that is of international standing and that will be recognised around the world. We want it to be transparent, fair, equitable and efficient.

On 16 February at the symposium on the research quality framework at the University of Western Australia, I said in a written statement:

As you know, my predecessor, Ms Jenny Macklin, expressed grave reservations about the RQF. These reservations included that the RQF is flawed, that it will mean that university ratings will be based on where the academic is now working, not where they did groundbreaking research, and that it involved too much paperwork for too little return.

As well, the Productivity Commission recently reported adversely on the proposed Framework.

Very many of these concerns have been put to me by your colleagues in the Higher Education Sector. As well, at the Australian Technology Network conference last week, it was also put to me that the RQF would reduce the research links with industry and lessen collegiate efforts among researchers and academics from different universities.

My colleague Senator Kim Carr, Shadow Minister for Science, recently said that he also had concerns about the RQF, including the proposed impact measure which is untried internationally and the cost and other resources involved in the assessment and reporting processes.

As I publicly indicated at the ATN conference, Labor has the RQF under review.

Labor supports high quality research in our universities. I regard that as essential. It is only through high quality research undertaken in our universities that we will make the advances we need to ensure the future of scientific discovery, critical thinking and learning.

Any research framework must be robust, rigorous and support an open and transparent process of peer review. It is only through a process of rigorous testing that we can be sure of genuine strength of research undertaken. Labor want a research quality assurance system that is of international standing.

I expect that our review will enable Labor to make its decision about the RQF in the course of the first half of this year.

Having expressed those concerns over the recent period and having had any number of conversations with those in the higher education sector, Labor has come to the conclusion that the RQF is fundamentally flawed. Our concluded view is that in government we will not proceed with the RQF. Labor believes that the RQF will be expensive to administer, that it sets the bar too low on quality measures, that it emphasises a poorly defined impact measure and that the adoption of the RQF will mean that university ratings would be based on where the academic is now working, not necessarily where the academic has done groundbreaking research.

It is not just Labor that has expressed reservations about the RQF. The Productivity Commission, in its research project Public support for science and innovation, released just this morning, again reported adversely on the proposed framework, noting:

The costs of implementing the Research Quality Framework may well exceed the benefits ...

And:

... while the RQF may bring some benefits, the UK and NZ experiences suggest that these would have to be substantial to offset the significant administrative and compliance costs.

As we know, the United Kingdom’s experience is that, at precisely that point when the Howard government seems so obsessive about introducing the research quality framework, it is moving away from the RAE on which the research quality framework is based.

Concerns have been expressed by the higher education sector itself, particularly that the RQF would reduce the research links with industry and lessen collegiate efforts among researchers and academics from different universities and that the assessment of quality and impact is of itself problematic.

In submissions to the Productivity Commission last year for the purposes of the Productivity Commission’s draft research report, the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering expressed ‘doubts about the value of such an approach’. Deakin University has said that the RQF criteria of quality and impact are not the only criteria for assessing research and, in some cases, are not the most important. That university has also said that the RQF will focus on research excellence, which will not catch all the important research outcomes. The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy has commented:

... the allocation of a single ranking based on aggregate scores for ‘Quality’ and ‘Impact’ ... is confusing, as these different measures protect interests which are of varying relative importance for different kinds of research.

The Australian Academy of the Humanities has said of the RQF approach:

... very little macro and micro-economic benefit analysis has been performed of the contributions of the humanities and creative arts to national innovation. This is ... due to the difficulty of measuring the impact of humanities research in such terms.

The Group of Eight universities stated in its follow-up submission to the Productivity Commission’s draft report:

There is a prospect that an RQF could become a burden to researchers, be expensive to administer and deliver very little reward to support and stimulate the best quality research.

The bill provides around $41 million for two programs to assist universities with the implementation of the research quality framework. While Labor believe that the research quality framework is fundamentally and fatally flawed, we support a policy of research quality assurance. Labor support high-quality research in our universities. As I have said before, I regard that as essential. It is only through high-quality research undertaken in our universities that we will make the advances we need to ensure the future of scientific discovery, critical thinking and learning. Any research framework must be robust and rigorous and must support an open and transparent process of peer review. It is only through a process of rigorous testing that we can be sure of the genuine strength of research undertaken.

Labor want a research quality assurance system of international standing. We believe there is a much better way of achieving that than through the government’s RQF. Labor believe that a research quality assurance system should be rigorous, transparent, fair, equitable and efficient. It should be recognised and accepted internationally as world’s best practice and should distribute funds in a way that transparently reflects research quality and achievement in our universities. It should encourage universities to concentrate on their respective research strengths, reward genuinely high achievement and weight research costs accurately by field and discipline. Further, it should promote university autonomy in decision making on research funding and policy and recognise and reward groundbreaking, long-term fundamental research whose full impact may not be apparent within a limited or arbitrary time frame. It should also provide separate, objective measures that reflect research quality in each broad discipline area—the arts and humanities, the social sciences and science and technology. The government’s research quality framework does not do these things.

To reflect all this, at the conclusion of my remarks I will formally move a second reading amendment in the following terms:

That all words after “That” be omitted with a view to substituting the following words:“whilst not declining to give the bill a second reading, the House notes that while assessing the quality and effectiveness of university research is a necessary and desirable public policy objective;

(1)

any initiative in this area must be robust, rigorous and support an open and transparent process of peer review;

(2)

as proposed by the Government, the RQF is likely to constitute a disincentive to undertake long-term, basic research;

(3)

the university sector has assessed that the RQF would reduce research links with industry and lessen collegiate efforts among researchers and academics from different universities;

(4)

essential aspects and details of the scheme are yet to be worked out, so that implementation for 2008 is in serious doubt;

(5)

the cost and other resources involved in the assessment and reporting processes mean that the Government’s proposed Research Quality Framework risks preventing breakthrough research from occurring by being overly bureaucratic for too little year on year return; and

(6)

the Research Quality Framework measures and processes as set out in the Bill should not be proceeded with, and should be replaced by a model that is fair, equitable, tailored to different disciplines and international best practice”.

As I said at the outset, Labor will not oppose the bill or the appropriation of this money. Labor does not support the government’s RQF approach but does support efforts and measures to increase the overall level of research undertaken in our universities. Labor believes that the money appropriated by this bill can be more effectively used either for research or in the development or implementation of an alternative research quality assessment system. Labor is currently consulting with the higher education sector and developing a policy which will be published in due course as a formal election commitment.

Those remarks cover that part of the bill which deals with the research quality framework. The bill also covers a number of other areas. One of the most significant is that it will amend the Higher Education Support Act 2003 to reflect changes made to the National Protocols for Higher Education Approval Processes. The national protocols regulate the recognition of new universities, the operation of overseas universities in Australia and the accreditation of courses offered by higher education institutions. The protocols were first approved by the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs in 2000 and were subsequently amended, by agreement, by all state and territory education ministers in July 2006.

The protocols agreed in 2006 were:

Protocol A Nationally agreed criteria and approval processes for all higher education institutions

Protocol B Criteria and processes for the registration of non self-accrediting higher education institutions and the accreditation of their higher education course/s

Protocol C Criteria and processes for awarding self-accrediting authority to higher education institutions other than universities

Protocol D Criteria and processes for establishing Australian universities

Protocol E Criteria and processes for overseas higher education institutions seeking to operate in Australia

The national protocols are widely recognised as an important component in the quality assurance of higher education in this country. As the ministerial council website states, the protocols:

… protect the standing of Australian higher education nationally and internationally by assuring students and the community that higher education institutions in Australia have met identified criteria and are subject to appropriate government regulation.

The national protocols apply to:

• all higher education institutions operating in Australia
• all higher education institutions seeking to operate in Australia
• all higher education institutions purporting to operate in Australia
• the offshore activities of all Australian higher education institutions
• arrangements in which some aspects of a higher education institution’s operations are carried out by other entities, such as through partnerships with other institutions, providers or business entities, the formation of companies, sub-contracting of services, or franchising. Whenever students are enrolled in a higher education institution or awards are conferred in the name of a higher education institution, the higher education institution is responsible for oversight of the arrangement and for ensuring the arrangement complies with the National Protocols.

Key changes to the national protocols agreed to in 2006 by state and territory ministers involve: the provision for a wider range of universities, including specialist institutions conducting teaching and research in one or two fields of study only and university colleges in the form of new universities undertaking teaching and research in a limited number of fields during an establishment phase; an identified process for institutions other than universities to become authorised to accredit their own courses—self-accrediting—where they demonstrate a strong track record in quality assurance and reaccreditation; and application of the protocols to both new and existing higher education institutions, with compliance to be assessed through the standard quality assurance processes.

The amendments made by this bill seek to give effect to the revised National Protocols for Higher Education Approval Processes. The Commonwealth, along with the states and territories, agreed to introduce and pass enabling legislation so that the national protocols take effect from the end of 2007. The intended effect of these revised protocols is threefold: to facilitate the establishment of centres of research and teaching excellence in the form of universities focused on narrow areas of expertise; to provide a clear mechanism for those institutions with strong track records in higher education delivery and quality assurance to become self-accrediting, and, under the stewardship of an established university, for provisional university colleges to develop into fully fledged institutions; and to extend their application to all new and existing higher education institutions.

These protocols are, in and of themselves, sensible measures agreed to jointly by the various ministers. By allowing international higher education providers and specialised higher education providers to establish themselves as universities or university colleges, the changes can be expected to lead to further competition in the university sector. Further liberalisation and greater competition among higher education providers can deliver results in terms of the specialisation provided by the various institutions. Greater specialisation in the higher education sector can provide a means to better tailor educational needs to the community and provide greater flexibility to respond to the needs of a modern workforce into the future.

But it must be done with care and caution. That means that any opening up to greater competition must be done with the appropriate checks and balances in place to ensure the protection and enhancement of academic standards. It cannot be allowed to lead to a diminution of academic standards or rigour in the approach taken by our higher education providers. This is particularly important in relation to our international reputation. Australia’s higher education exports are worth around $10 billion a year and rising. We have achieved this because we have built a good international reputation. We cannot have an accreditation regime that allows for the standards of our higher education providers to be eroded through a protocol regime that would or could lead to a free-for-all in the sector and a downward—not upward—movement of academic standards.

The protocol changes that are the subject of this bill cannot lead to a situation that allows or tolerates a diminution of our good reputation internationally. And we cannot allow it to encourage or foster the sorts of situations we have seen in recent weeks with some education providers that actively rip students off by subjecting them to substandard teaching and poor facilities. A further reason for this concern relates to the fact that, although the protocols have been agreed to, the guidelines that underpin and give effect to these protocols have not yet been formally agreed to. That is not scheduled to occur at the earliest until the upcoming meeting of the ministerial council on 12 and 13 April. It is somewhat like putting the cart before the horse. It is one thing to agree on the broad direction and another altogether to agree on the detail of how to achieve it. That is why Labor believes it is important to refer this point to the Senate Standing Committee on Employment, Workplace Relations and Education for brief inquiry.

The bill also seeks to do a number of other things. This includes: introducing a number of measures regarding the administration of the Higher Education Loan Program, the HELP scheme, and arrangements for Commonwealth supported students; amending the Higher Education Support Act 2003, the Higher Education Funding Act 1988 and the Higher Education Support (Transitional Provisions and Consequential Amendments) Act 2003 to limit the time for students to claim an entitlement to Commonwealth support; revising the maximum funding amounts provided under the Higher Education Support Act 2003 to provide funding to support the implementation of the research quality framework; and making a number of minor amendments intended to improve the operation of the Higher Education Support Act.

The bill includes a number of measures regarding the administration of the Higher Education Loan Program and arrangements for Commonwealth supported students. Firstly, the bill includes amendments to clarify the overseas study requirements in relation to eligibility for OS-HELP assistance. The effect of this is that Australian students already studying overseas can apply for OS-HELP assistance. OS-HELP is only available to those undergraduate students studying part of their course overseas.

Secondly, the amendments in this bill clarify that nothing requires a higher education provider to advise students that they are Commonwealth supported at a particular campus of the provider. The effect of this is that higher education providers will be able to determine which campus will offer particular courses of study to Commonwealth supported students. In other words, the amendment allows higher education providers to specify that a student may be a Commonwealth supported student for units of study on the condition that the student undertakes those units at a particular campus of the provider.

Thirdly, the amendments in this bill clarify the residency requirements in relation to Commonwealth support and HECS-HELP and FEE-HELP assistance for study undertaken overseas. The effect of this is that permanent residents and holders of certain visas, including those granted on humanitarian grounds, will not be entitled to Commonwealth support or to HECS-HELP or FEE-HELP assistance if they are undertaking part or all of their higher education course overseas.

In addition, in the minister’s second reading speech introducing this legislation she said:

The bill requires that Commonwealth supported students must reside in Australia while undertaking their studies (although provision is made to ensure entitlement to Commonwealth support and assistance where a student is required to be overseas for part of their course of study).

The notion that all Commonwealth supported students must reside in Australia while undertaking their studies has raised some concern amongst both the public and some higher education providers about the restrictions potentially being introduced by the government on the studies undertaken by students. The prima facie impact of this would be to exclude students studying overseas via distance education or on exchange from accessing HECS-HELP or FEE-HELP. My office has been assured by the minister’s office that this is not the intention, and I would ask that the minister confirm this in her reply in the debate.

Fourthly, these amendments will allow providers to advise students that they will be Commonwealth supported for cross-institutional study where one or both of the higher education providers are not table A providers. This is a change from the previous requirement for Commonwealth supported students to only undertake study in Commonwealth supported places in a cross-institutional arrangement where both providers were table A providers.

Before I conclude, I will touch on another demonstration that the government is rushing this legislation through. The government is moving amendments to its own legislation, and those amendments have been circulated. The amendments are in two areas. The first is to section 3-5(2), inserting a new information provision to refer to the range of different higher education entities and types of approval that they will receive under chapter 6 once the bill is enacted. The second amendment is at section 19-20, to correct the paragraph so that it refers to requirements imposed on higher education providers being done by ‘a government accreditation authority’ instead of ‘an authorised accreditation authority’.

These amendments appear sensible enough, but I make this point: the fact that the government has to make them at all when it is the government’s own legislation indicates that they have rushed this legislation through the parliament. Rushing legislation through the parliament without due process and time for examination is always a concern. When it contains errors and oversights, it is doubly so.

As I indicated at the outset, Labor does not oppose this legislation. But there are issues to which I have referred that in our view require further examination and some questions answered. That is why we propose to refer it to committee in the other place and we reserve our right to move or support amendments that may come out of such a limited Senate inquiry. I commend the bill to the House and I move the second reading amendment circulated in my name:

That all words after “That” be omitted with a view to substituting the following words:“whilst not declining to give the bill a second reading, the House notes that while assessing the quality and effectiveness of university research is a necessary and desirable public policy objective;

(1)

any initiative in this area must be robust, rigorous and support an open and transparent process of peer review;

(2)

as proposed by the Government, the RQF is likely to constitute a disincentive to undertake long-term, basic research;

(3)

the university sector has assessed that the RQF would reduce research links with industry and lessen collegiate efforts among researchers and academics from different universities;

(4)

essential aspects and details of the scheme are yet to be worked out, so that implementation for 2008 is in serious doubt;

(5)

the cost and other resources involved in the assessment and reporting processes mean that the Government’s proposed Research Quality Framework risks preventing breakthrough research from occurring by being overly bureaucratic for too little year on year return; and

(6)

the Research Quality Framework measures and processes as set out in the Bill should not be proceeded with, and should be replaced by a model that is fair, equitable, tailored to different disciplines and international best practice”.

See this speech in context