Zoe Daniel (Goldstein, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Holt for this motion on the Australian Universities Accord. Young people are under pressure in ways that most of us were not at that age. They're living with instability, insecurity and uncertainty that, if not unprecedented, has certainly not been seen in the years since HECS was introduced more than three decades ago. Employment is much less secure than it was then, and there's no certainty that a university degree will reward a graduate with higher income than someone without tertiary qualifications.

On top of all that, young people are living amid a once-in-a-generation cost-of-living crisis. Rents have reached a record high, with the median weekly rent in Australia now at $627, which is 8.5 per cent higher than at this time last year. The days when it was relatively easy to find an affordable share house are over, as are the days when students could be sure their pay in part-time jobs would keep pace with inflation. In real terms, although wages have recently finally grown slightly, the average wage is now the same as in 2011. Meanwhile, the escalation in tuition fees means that graduates have much higher HECS debts in real terms than even a decade ago and much more than when the system was introduced.

Taxation Office data compiled by the Australia Institute shows that Australians in their 20s with a HECS-HELP debt in 2005-06 had an average debt of around $12,500. From then until June 2023, total inflation was 57 per cent. Had the average size of debt increased in line with inflation, the average 2022-23 HECS-HELP debt held by people in their 20s should have been around $19,500. Instead, according to the Australia Institute, the average debt had risen by 145 per cent and was $30,763. That doesn't consider the Morrison government's ineffective and punitive Job-ready Graduates Package, which saw the cost of a communications degree, for example, rise from around $20,400 to $43,500.

It was early in 2023, before that year's federal budget, that I called on the Minister for Education to recognise the difficulties high inflation was creating for students and recent graduates by reforming the indexation formula for HECS-HELP debts. I suggested then that the formula should be determined based on whatever was lower: the consumer price index or the wage price index. Although it took a year, the minister added it to the work program for the Universities Accord review, which accepted and recommended the change in this year's budget, helped along by a massive petition launched by the member of Kooyong. The government announcement—by backdating the change to last year, when HECS indexation was pledged to an inflation figure of 7.1 per cent—is wiping out around $3 billion in student debt for more than three million Australians. Those with an average debt will see their liability cut by $1,200.

There is more that the government should be doing. It should be altering the timing of indexation until after compulsory repayments made over the year have been calculated, rather than before, a step that would save debtors hundreds of dollars annually. One option would be to move the indexation date from late in the tax year until after the tax return due date of 31 October. I do welcome the fact that the minister has approached banks to encourage them not to consider HECS-HELP debt when calculating eligibility for a home loan.

I have spent much of this speech talking about HECS because we need to resolve these issues to enable young people to reach their full potential. If 80 per cent of the workforce will need a tertiary qualification by 2050, we must remove the roadblocks to study. Sorting out HECS and HELP is a critical piece of this.

Last year, I also raised the issue of sexual assault on campus with the minister, pointing out the horrendous statistic that one in 20 students had been sexually assaulted since starting uni. I and other members of the crossbench introduced the minister to students from Fair Agenda who have been advocating for years for an ombudsman to tackle gender based violence at universities. This is also being delivered, and I'm very pleased that the minister has done so.

There is much more that I could say about the Universities Accord, but, given the available time, I will conclude by saying this: it is encouraging to see a report that provides an ambitious vision for tertiary education to underpin the future of our nation. Properly intersected university and vocational education is key to this, because education is power for individuals and for societies, including Australia.

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