Darren Chester (Gippsland, National Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Roads and Regional Transport) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of the amendment to the Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs and Other Legislation Amendment (Election Commitments and Other Measures) Bill 2011. This is a very important amendment which seeks to provide a fairer and a more equitable system of student income support via the independent youth allowance. In particular, this amendment deals with the workforce participation criteria for the independent youth allowance and the discriminatory system of inner regional and outer regional classifications, which is unfairly affecting students in Gippsland and across regional Australia. I have spoken on the broader issue of income support on many occasions during my almost three years in this place. It is important to remind the House about some of the history of this debate and, some would say, the history of this debacle.

The former Minister for Education Julia Gillard created a mess in the May 2009 budget with her attack on gap year students. The retrospective nature of the government’s legislation caused the problems for regional students in the first place. What erupted was a fight right across regional Australia—not just in Gippsland but in every regional community. The member for Cowper, who is with me tonight, and other members right across regional Australia were inundated with calls from students, from teachers and from parents and friends of students. They were angry and they are still angry today. Dozens of petitions were presented to this place, with many thousands of people protesting about the gap year arrangements as proposed by the education minister of the time. There were rallies in many regional communities where students spoke out against the injustice that was forced upon them by Julia Gillard as education minister.

To her credit, the minister finally backed down, but the only reason she backed down was that she realised she had a political problem. I would like to tell the Prime Minister now that she has another political problem. This system of discriminating against regional students on the basis of lines on a map will hang around her neck like a dead albatross until the next election. Regional MPs opposite may think that this is some sort of political game. Let me assure them that when it comes to student income support I am not about political games. This is about achieving a fair and equitable outcome for regional students who right now are being discriminated against by this government—and this government knows it. The political futures of regional MPs—and I include Labor MPs and Independent MPs—are at stake in this debate. There is a depth of passion in regional communities which you probably have not noticed. If you do not wake up to it soon, the price you will pay at the ballot box will be extreme.

I appeal to Julia Gillard as a former education minister and as Prime Minister to finally understand: you have completely misread regional Australia. You have completely misread this issue from start to finish. Rural people are very slow to anger, but I can assure you they do not forget and they will not forget a Prime Minister who had the capacity to deliver a fairer and more equitable system of student income support and failed. They will never forget that they had a Prime Minister who came in here and talked about the education revolution, who staked her whole career on her reputation in relation to education, but who, when she had the chance to do something which was in the interests of students right across regional Australia, failed miserably. Students across Australia and their parents and teachers want us to fix this mess, and this amendment before the House tonight is the first step.

I am concerned that the Independent MPs from the regional communities—the member for Denison, the member for Lyne and the member for New England—have fallen for the sucker punch here. They believed this government’s assurances just a couple of weeks ago that it will take action in January next year to try and fix the mess in relation to the inner regional and outer regional classifications. But surely they are beginning to realise that a promise from this government is not worth anything and it is certainly not worth anything to the students from the 2009 and 2010 cohorts who will miss out while the Independent MPs continue to support the Gillard government’s procrastination on this issue.

The workforce criteria problems as they exist right now exist because we have two systems in place—this classification of outer regional and inner regional. If you are regarded as an outer regional student, you face easier criteria to achieve the independent status, but for students in inner regional areas—and in my electorate these include towns like Sale, Maffra, Hayfield; these are very small towns which are regarded as inner regional—finding full-time employment in those regional areas and small communities is often very difficult for the students. They struggle to achieve the independent criterion of 30 hours per week over a total two-year time frame.

This legislation also does not take into account the seasonal nature of many jobs in regional communities—particularly the tourism sector and the agricultural sector in my electorate—which creates another barrier for regional students, and here I am referring particularly to inner regional students. What we are talking about here tonight with this amendment is a system of fairness and equity of access for all regional students, who, as we understand, are often forced to move away from home to pursue higher education. The Prime Minister needs to end the hollow rhetoric about an education revolution and start cleaning up the mess that exists in student income support. Even the current Minister for Tertiary Education, Skills, Jobs and Workplace Relations has acknowledged this is a mess. He was on ABC Gippsland radio recently and said the current system ‘was an inelegant solution’ and he also admitted it was ‘a bit untidy’. The students, parents and teachers listening would have other words to describe the mess that has been created by this government.

The pathetic solution that is being put forward now is to bring forward an inquiry and make it report a bit earlier, by 1 July this year. But the minister himself is already backing away from any suggestion that he will address the issue of inner regional and outer regional classifications for the purpose of accessing independent youth allowance. The Independent MPs should be taking note of every word that comes out of the education minister’s mouth in relation to this. They did a deal a fraction over two weeks ago, and he is already backing away from that deal. I take note of the earlier comments of the member for Shortland. She said that the Gillard government views education as vitally important. People on this side of the House view education as vitally important as well, and we are demanding a fair go for students in regional communities. This, as I said, is a major issue right across regional Australia, and it is another fundamental breach of trust by the Gillard government.

The members who shake their heads—who come from metropolitan areas or from regional communities and who think that we are playing a game on this particular issue—need to understand the stress and the uncertainty that they have created right throughout regional Australia with these changes. I would probably be getting 10 calls a week in my office from parents in the inner regional area who are trying to find a way for their child to access youth allowance. I acknowledge that there are two ways to access youth allowance: either dependent youth allowance or independent youth allowance. I have acknowledged from day one that the changes to the income threshold for dependent youth allowance have been well received in regional communities and they have been seen as positive steps right throughout regional Australia. I commended the Prime Minister for those changes when she was previously the Minister for Education. But the issue of independent youth allowance is where the government has failed miserably and caused enormous confusion and enormous uncertainty.

What people opposite do not seem to understand is that these students make their decisions years in advance of actually going to university. They start setting their career pathways in year 9 and year 10, in consultation with their careers advisers and their school principals. So this uncertainty and the confusion over how the criteria will apply for independent youth allowance has already affected students from the 2009 and 2010 cohorts. Continuing this holding pattern until January next year is just making it more difficult for students right throughout regional areas. The real holding pattern from 1 July this year should be to abolish the current arrangements of inner regional and outer regional and give all regional students the same access to independent youth allowance. That should be the holding pattern until this review is completed. Then the review should continue, and the review should completely overhaul the system of student income support. The changes from 1 January next year, rather than talking about changes in inner regional and outer regional, should be looking at a complete overhaul of student income support, with a tertiary access allowance which addresses this fundamental inequity for regional students.

Mr Deputy Speaker Kelvin Thomson, I acknowledge that you represent an inner Melbourne seat. But the members who represent regional seats see that the extra costs borne by parents from our community to send their children to university are becoming such an onerous burden that students are simply bailing out of the system. We have young people who have the potential to go on to achieve great things at university who are making the decision, for economic reasons, to remain in a regional community, and I fear we are selling those children short. I believe we can do better in this place than to have regional students curtailing their ambitions and forfeiting their dreams of higher education simply because we have a government that talks big about an education revolution but fails to deliver when it comes to real support for regional families. This is a social issue and it is an economic issue. We are taking money out of regional towns to pay for the accommodation for country students when they go to metropolitan areas to attend university. We are stripping wealth out of regional communities to do that. There is no compensation whatsoever for the families, and it is becoming more and more difficult in these times of increased costs of living for families to make those financial commitments.

As you heard the member for Parkes refer to earlier, families are making very tough decisions and having to choose which one of their children can attend a university and which student has to remain in the regional community. We in this place need to reduce the economic barriers for regional students who are forced to leave home to attend university. The social issue is very apparent to all of us who live in a regional area. The importance of regional communities having opportunities to train our own young people to take on roles in areas such as health, engineering or other tertiary-qualified areas is well understood. We know—and various studies have proven this—that if country kids get the opportunity to go to university then they are more likely to return to a regional community in the future and contribute their skills to that regional area. They are much more likely to return and address some of those major issues we have, particularly in the area of health services. But our participation rates in regional communities when it comes to tertiary courses are much lower than those of our metropolitan counterparts.

Unless you fundamentally believe that country kids are dumber than city kids, there must be an issue. The issue is the economic barrier. We in this place have the power to start reducing the economic barrier and stop robbing country kids of the opportunity to achieve their full potential. This is a chance for us here in this place to stand up for regional students. It is a chance for those opposite to live up to their rhetoric about the education revolution and actually start delivering on the transformational power of education that they talk about but unfortunately have failed to deliver in their time in this place.

Finally, I would like to thank my colleagues, both in this chamber and in the other place, for their determination in pursuing this issue. Those opposite may be getting sick of us standing up here, talking about youth allowance. They may be getting sick of us attaching amendments to various bills. Let me assure them that we will continue to pursue this issue until we finally get a fair result for regional students. I want to thank the thousands of parents, teachers and students who have rallied to support this cause right throughout Australia. From the day we rallied together in 2009 to stop the unfair treatment of gap year students, we have held the Rudd government and the Gillard government to account on this issue. We must continue that fight. To those people from regional communities who are listening tonight, let me assure you that there are members in this place, on this side of the House—such as the member for Parkes, the member for Cowper, the member for Mallee, the member for Menzies, the member for Calare and the member for Mackellar, who are all in the chamber—who are determined to fight this case until we finally get a fair and equitable system for regional communities.

I would also particularly like to thank Senator Fiona Nash for the work that she has done on this issue, along with the member for Sturt—the shadow minister for education—and the member for Forrest, who we have heard from tonight. They have been at the forefront of this issue and are continuing to pursue the government in relation to getting a fairer deal for regional students. There have been many other coalition members—I have just named a few—who have fought the good fight. We will continue that fight, and I urge all concerned Australians who may be listening to this broadcast tonight to raise this issue at every opportunity. Write to your Labor regional MP. Write to your Independent MP in regional communities and demand a better deal. Write to them. Send them an email. Ring them up. The only way they are going to listen is with people pressure. Once this Prime Minister realises she has a political problem, she will take action. That is the only way this government listens to the people of Australia. We must continue to highlight this issue in the interests of fairness and the interests of equity for regional Australian students. I thank the House.

See this speech in context