Sussan Ley (Farrer, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Women) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

LEY (—) (): My question is to the Prime Minister. The government's own question time brief says that the most enrolled fee-free TAFE courses include early childhood, cybersecurity and individual care and support—courses that take at most six to 12 months to complete. Can the Prime Minister confirm that the completion rate for these courses is as low as 13 per cent?

Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank, again, the Deputy Leader of the Opposition for her question. I'm not sure whether it's the idea of giving people the opportunity to achieve their aspirations to get a better life which is so offensive or the fact that TAFE often comes with a word in front of it that they find offensive—'public'—and that it's part of the public system and that it opens up opportunities for everyone. We know it's a triggering word for those opposite. We've had a range of criticisms put. The fact is 35,000 of these places are construction sector. There are 131,000 in the care sector. Forty-nine thousand are technology and digital enrolments. Fee-free TAFE has been operating for less than two years. We know that that is the case.

To give the big tip—because many courses, 89 per cent of fee-free TAFE courses, are certificate III and above—certificate III and above require courses up to three years with full-time study—something that's beyond those opposite. Fee-free TAFE was introduced in Victoria in 2019. The four-year completion rate for free TAFE in Victoria is higher than the four-year national average for university students in the same time period. That's a fact. Those opposite not only want to stop students getting less debt; they now want to denigrate them on the way through. We know why. It's incredible that Senator Sarah Henderson said, 'It's a tax cut targeted to the big end of town'. She also said, 'Labor's policy reeks of unfairness and elitism.'

The Leader of the Nats said, 'There's a lot of nice to haves, but we're in a cost-of-living crisis, where we can't just look after three million people.' This is the same bloke who said that we can't change the tax cuts to look after every taxpayer. That was a disaster. They're all over the shop. Free TAFE is here to stay, and it's a good thing. I encourage you to continue to oppose it. (Time expired)