Rebekha Sharkie (Mayo, Nick Xenophon Team) Share this | Hansard source

As I rise to speak on this bill, I must begin by reiterating my support for Australia's higher education sector. For the sector to thrive, it must be sustainable. There is a delicate balance to be struck and I believe that the government's previous reform package, which failed to pass the Senate, did not get the balance right. I believe this bill comes a lot closer, although there are amendments that NXT will be seeking before we give our wholehearted support.

This bill presents two major changes to the current system: firstly, a reduction in the HELP repayment threshold to $45,000, and, secondly, a cap on the loan amount a student can access in their lifetime. The idea of a cap on the amount of money a student can borrow from the Commonwealth is one I agree with in principle. In fact, I first raised this idea with Minister Birmingham last year. I believe that Australia's Higher Education Loan Program is world leading and something this country can be proud of. It allows students from all backgrounds to access university education without having the burden of up-front cost that students in many other countries face.

However, as with any Commonwealth loan, it should not be a free-for-all. A university education gives a proven benefit to Australian society, but it is not in the nation's interests for the HELP scheme to be open slather with mounting debts, some of which will never be repaid. A cap sends an important message to students that the government will not support elongated study where it results in excessive loan amounts that are unlikely to be repaid. A student should understand that. Just like any other loan or debt, student loans must be repaid. Being a professional student, collecting endless degrees and not moving into a job really isn't viable for our nation.

However, a lifetime cap is also not the answer. Increasingly, it's becoming clear that lifelong learning will become a regular feature of the Australian way of life. This government has, indeed, foreshadowed this. I again make reference to the Prime Minister's first statement as the leader of our country, where he stressed that he wanted Australia to be innovative and agile. Clearly, the ability to learn new things and to upskill is a fundamental part of being an innovative nation. For that reason, I struggle to understand why the government has proposed a lifetime cap on student learning.

We should not be asking Australian students to be put in a position where they can graduate, work and pay off their HELP loans and yet be prevented from accessing Commonwealth support for future study. We know that today's graduates are likely to change jobs 17 times in their lifetime, and will most likely change career sectors completely. So, for this reason, I'm calling on the government to amend this bill to ensure that we can place a cap on student outstanding debt but that we can also ensure that if a person does pay off that debt, if they get below their cap, they can continue to study in another area at another time in their life. I note that this recommendation was put forward by the Senate Standing Committee on Education and Employment and, indeed, government members of the committee supported that the cap would be replenishable. I understand the government will be moving amendments to change this aspect of the bill, and I look forward to those amendments being moved.

This bill also seeks to reduce the payment threshold for HELP loans to $45,000. I spoke on this issue during the debate of last year's higher education reform package, where I and my NXT colleagues rejected a proposal to lower the threshold to $42,000. I said then that I was willing to consider alternative thresholds, and that is the position that I maintain and NXT maintains. Australia's HELP system is one of the most generous in the world, significantly more so than the New Zealand system, which has a repayment threshold of $18,000, and the UK system, which has a repayment threshold of approximately A$36,000. I recognise that there is a growing amount of outstanding student debt, and the government does not expect this to be repaid. For this reason, NXT is willing to consider the proposed change to the thresholds if the government can commit to changing the lifetime cap to being a replenishable cap. I believe that a significant benefit of this measure over the government's previous proposal is ensuring that the repayment rate does not lift above one per cent until a graduate is earning over $51,000 per year. We believe this is a reasonable balance.

I take this opportunity again to reiterate my previous calls for a comprehensive review into the post-secondary education sector. I called for such a review last October, and I am pleased to see that this has become part of the policy for the Australian Labor Party. This review must involve the federal and state governments. It must involve universities and the vocational education sector, including, of course, apprenticeships. We need to examine how we prepare the next generation for the world of work and ensure the pillars are in place for young people to successfully transition to sustainable employment.

Australia's higher education sector is one of the best in the world, but it needs to be supported. The government's recent cuts to universities during MYEFO were a cruel blow to the sector, and it is a sector that has faced so many cuts in recent years from both sides of the House. I believe this bill should be amended and that it will contribute to a stronger higher education sector. So for this reason I support the bill in this House, pending those amendments by government, as I referred to. Thank you.

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