Lisa Chesters (Bendigo, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I took one earlier. I will not take one today. Why do I raise the funding cuts to TAFE? Because it goes to the record of the Liberal-National Party when they get into government and make funding cuts, particularly in relation to regional areas. As I said, it is not just the jobs but also the courses that will be lost with these cuts. Courses and skills will be lost. What it will mean for these students is that they will have to travel long distances to get their vocational training. This is our concern about what will happen with the proposed funding cuts in this bill.

I go back to why Labor is opposing the bill before us. The proposed savings measures were to fund the Better Schools Plan. Whilst I have my own reservations about the plan—I was not in the House at the time the measures were introduced—it was a decision by the government of the day, which was that we needed to spread the education dollars across the sector. However, given that the coalition have walked away from the Better Schools Plan—they have walked away from funding schools to the level that Labor proposed—there is no need to proceed with these cuts. The government are planning to cut an extra $1.3 billion from education. This, again, just speaks to what they do when they get back into government. The coalition are making sure that, whilst they are cutting the funding to higher education, they are not putting it into the primary schools, the secondary schools or even the early years education.

Labor are committed to ensuring that Australians get the best education throughout all stages of our lives. Again, I remind the House that we still do not know where we are with the Early Years Quality Fund. Today, we have seen the flip-flop, back-flop, who-knows-what-to-call-it on Gonski funding. We do not know what the government's commitments are on learning. We do not know if the schools in Bendigo will get their extra funding when it comes to the regions. We do not know if they will get it in terms of a loading for disability. We do not know if they will get it in terms of being low-socioeconomic schools. So there are cuts and cutbacks all over the education board. When we were in government, our position was quite clear: it was to spread the funding across the board, not to cut it from everywhere—which is exactly what we see this government trying to do today.

I also want to highlight what the former Labor government did in terms of university funding. Real funding to universities increased during the six years that Labor were in government. It increased for regional campuses by about 56 per cent, and for my own campus at Bendigo-La Trobe by 47 per cent. This meant that more students were studying at La Trobe University. This funding included the building of the Rural Health School. It included new accommodation spaces and also a number of other facilities which the campus was in desperate need of. I believe that the funding at this campus needs to continue.

We also saw the previous government's commitment to regions, with the number of university places increasing from roughly 62,000 in 2007 to 81,000 in 2013. That is a 30 per cent increase. That is what we experienced at the Bendigo campus, La Trobe University. I mentioned that the funding increased significantly when Labor were in government. We also saw an increase in the number of students in the regions who qualified for youth allowance. It may come as a surprise to some in this House that Bendigo, with its surrounding areas, is actually quite a poor electorate, with over 30 per cent of families on a household income of less than $600 a week. So the move to allow more students to get youth allowance was an important step. Again, it is recognition that Labor actually stood up for the regions and provided a good deal. So there has been an increase in the number students receiving youth allowance. There has been an increase in the number of students attending regional campuses, particularly at La Trobe University. There has been an increase in the number of students from low-socioeconomic areas going to university. And there has been an increase in funding facilities that these campuses need. Again, this speaks to Labor's record on higher education.

I am one of youngest—but not the youngest— members of this House and in 1996, when the coalition came to government, I can remember being a young student almost ready to enrol at university and seeing the beginning of those first savage cuts to higher education. In 1996 I can remember what this meant: the tripling of HECS fees overnight. When I finally did go to university in 1999, in my first year at the University of Queensland, students and academics held rallies over the courses that were being cut. The last time the coalition took government, universities had to seek funding from major corporations to keep courses afloat. We have seen what happened to universities over the many years of the Howard government. Key faculties were lost, such as the history department at the University of Melbourne. Universities told departments that they had to turn a profit and break even. This is what happens when governments cut funding to higher education, as we saw under the coalition government when they were last in government from 1996 and beyond.

In the time that I have remaining today, I want to reiterate a couple of points that people raised in my electorate during the campaign. An issue that is very dear to a number of people in Bendigo is that they want Bendigo to be a university city. They seek to have a strong higher education sector, whether it be the university or the TAFE. Bendigo seeks to be an area that is able to service the region—so, it will attract students not just from Bendigo but from around the area. This would give people the opportunity to receive a quality education in their area and not have to go to Melbourne for one. But if the funding cuts continue, if the funding envelope for the whole of education continues to be whittled away, then it will affect the universities, as we have highlighted today, and all students will suffer.

In conclusion, you cannot have it both ways. You cannot cut funding from universities and not put it into the schools; you cannot cut funding from the schools and not restore it to universities. There is funding that is required for education to ensure that every student receives a quality education. Labor, in government, ensured that that funding was spread across the board, but all we have seen since the election of the National-Liberal government is funding cuts across the board in every sector.

This is something that we need to take a stand against and say: 'You have to increase the funding. You have to restore the funding across the board, whether it be early childhood education; primary and second schools, through the Better Schools Plan; our TAFE sector or our university sector.' It is time we saw some real action from the government on higher education to ensure that everybody gets a decent opportunity.

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