Michelle Ananda-Rajah (Higgins, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Education is the most powerful weapon against disadvantage. Higher education, including university and vocational training, has been described as 'the ticket to the show', according to our education minister. The average annual income for a university graduate is $100,000, compared to $70,000 for someone whose last year of education was year 12. The jobs of the future will require higher education qualifications. There is not a parent, school student or uni student in Higgins who is not invested in the quality of our higher education system. The 2021 Census revealed that, for people in my electorate aged 15 years and over, 61 per cent have a university degree or diploma, while 13 per cent have a vocational qualification or are doing an apprenticeship. That's over 70 per cent in total.

These figures are in stark contrast to single-digit rates of university attainment in some parts of Australia—swathes of it, in fact. Such inequity is unacceptable when our Commonwealth rests on unlocking the talent of our people, young and old alike.

The Albanese government is well aware that our higher education sector is an engine for ideas that imbues industry, business, science the arts and culture. The engine, however, needs more than an oil change. It needs an overhaul. The higher education sector is simply not enabling our nation in the way it could. Not enough Australians are getting a foot in the door. In fact, not enough Australians even aspire to the heights of attaining higher education.

Too many students, having walked those halls, are being booted off due to poor grades or to external factors like an inability to make ends meet. The student experience has become an afterthought, a poor cousin to research output which, in itself, has generated perverse outcomes that are not meeting the national interest. Publications over impactful, real world outcomes. Academic and support staff among our brightest enjoy all the security of gig workers. Financial viability of universities is excessively linked to vulnerable flows from international students. Parents fret about their daughters' safety on campus, with sexual harassment and victimisation—and worse—rife. Student services, the scaffolding run by student led unions, have been hollowed out under those opposite, but, had they been healthy, they may have thinned out those breadlines of young people we saw during the darkest days of the pandemic.

Why this sector was allowed to drift speaks to the culture of 'set and forget' we inherited following a wasted decade under those opposite. However, the Albanese government does not shy away from the hard work of reform, especially when there is so much at stake. We established the Australian Universities Accord to drive an enduring alignment between our higher education sector and the intellectual, cultural community and economic development of our nation. As described by Jenny Macklin, a panel member:

Accords bring people together to discuss challenges and agree on a joint path forward. In high education this could mean a continuous and dynamic process of government coming together with universities, higher education providers, students, business, unions and community leaders to agree on the best way that higher education can meet Australia's economic, cultural and social aspirations and allow them to be continually developed over time

The accord is about taking what's good and making it better, ensuring that our universities can help Australia tackle the big issues facing us over time. It is an investment in our greatest asset: human capital. The accord is being led by a panel of pre-eminent Australians from education, business and public policy, with metropolitan and regional representation, and it has bipartisan support on the panel. The panel members are: Professor Mary O'Kane, who I've had the pleasure of meeting; the Hon. Jenny Macklin; Ms Shemara Wikramanayake; Professor Barney Glover; Distinguished Professor Larissa Behrendt; and the Hon. Fiona Nash, a champion for regional Australia.

After months of a travelling road show of consultation in regional and metropolitan communities, the highly anticipated University Accord Interim Report was released on 19 July. I would like to thank the panel and support staff for their time, generosity and guidance.

The amendments proposed today seek to implement priority recommendations from the interim report. These were deemed too important to wait, and they include: that we create more university study hubs, not only in the regions but in our outer suburbs, to reduce the tyranny of distance and cost; and that we abolish the 50 per cent pass rule for students to remain eligible for Commonwealth assistance. This hurdle disproportionately affected students from underrepresented and often poorer backgrounds—the very people we want to open the door to. The pass rate is assessed after students have completed eight units of a bachelor's degree or higher or four units in a shorter course. Students who fail more than half currently lose their Commonwealth assistance.

This punitive measure was introduced in January of last year by the former Liberal government, as part of its jobs-ready-program thought bubble, to dissuade students from undertaking courses that they were not academically suited for. Rather than birthing aspiration, it killed it. More than 13,000 students at 27 universities have been hit by the rule, with their futures cut short—what a loss.

Universities and other providers will now be compelled to provide the scaffolding to aid successful completions. They will have to demonstrate how they are identifying struggling students—I'll give them a hint: ask them—and how they will connect those students with support services. Here's another tip: invest in student services—they actually work. Civil penalties will apply for compliance breaches. Universities from all around the country—including Monash, the University of Adelaide, UTS, the University of the Sunshine Coast, the University of New England, QUT and Western Sydney University—have been calling for this change. We have listened.

We will extend the demand driven funding—meaning it has no cap—currently provided to Indigenous students from the regions to cover all Indigenous students undertaking a bachelor's or bachelor's-honours level degree, other than medicine, from 2024. We need to create pathways that lead Indigenous students into learning and away from jail. This speaks directly towards Closing the Gap outcome 6—to increase the number of Indigenous young adults aged 25 to 34 years who have obtained a tertiary qualification to 70 per cent by 2031. We intend to shore up funding certainty for universities by extending the Higher Education Continuity Guarantee into 2024-25, and we will work with subnational governments to improve university governance.

Part of the governance mandate is a commitment to stamp out sexual harassment and victimisation. This is why we have appointed the CEO of Our Watch today to lead a working panel to intervene, not navel gaze. We can't afford to wait when one in 20 students has been sexually assaulted and one in six sexually harassed. These students have been met with grossly inadequate responses from universities that are confusing and retraumatising. It has taken far too long to act on this issue. Previous Liberal governments could have acted, but they dithered and delayed, so we are making this an immediate, not deferred, priority.

The interim report is an invitation for feedback. What should stay? What should go? Bold ideas and tweaks are welcome. A key outcome of our Jobs and Skills Summit, including the one I held in Higgins in September of last year, was the need to fast-track skills acquisition to help people find their niche. As one attendee said:

We need flexible, accelerated training programs to develop intersectional expertise—the future lies at the intersection of multiple domains.

Hence we are investing $18.5 million to deliver microcredential courses in areas such as IT, engineering, health and education. Rather than having six career changes in your lifetime, a somewhat dubious claim, these short courses will enable people, young and older, to upskill or reskill with targeted work-ready skills.

A future focused economy demands securing pipelines free of leaks, from every corner of this country to our universities, for the enablement of a skilled workforce, and we will need that workforce for the renaissance of Australian industrialisation in green energy, our defence program and onshore manufacturing. The only ticket should be a burning desire to spread your wings, with universities providing the uplift to help our young people soar. I commend this bill to the House.

See this speech in context