Joanne Ryan (Lalor, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Education. What is the Albanese Labor government doing to build a better and fairer education system, and what has been the response?

Jason Clare (Blaxland, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Education) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank my friend, the legendary member for Lawler, for her question. Big things are happening in education. On Monday, the 15 per cent pay rise for early educators was passed through this House. Today in parliament we are debating legislation to increase funding for our public schools. On the weekend, we announced that, if we win the next election, the first piece of legislation that we will introduce will cut student debt by 20 per cent. All of this is about making our education system better and fairer. Our early educators do some of the most important work in this country, but you would not know that from what they are paid. The 15 per cent pay rise that this Prime Minister has made happen fixes that. The first part of that pay rise rolls out in just 25 days time. The increased funding for our public schools is critical to make sure that we turn around the drop in the number of young people finishing high school and to help young people who fall behind when they are very, very young in primary school to catch up and keep up.

As I said yesterday, the fact is that university is more expensive today than when most of us were there. When HECS was first created, students paid about 24 per cent of the cost of a degree. Under John Howard this increased to 36 per cent. Under Scott Morrison this increased again to almost 45 per cent. We are cutting the debt for three million Australians who were hurt by these Liberal changes. For someone with an average debt, we are cutting it by $5,500.

What does the Liberal Party say about this? They say that this is terrible—'terrible'. They say this is a terrible thing to do. I was contacted this week by the architect of HECS, Professor Bruce Chapman, and this is what he said: 'It is generally and correctly believed that the overall level of HECS-HELP debt has become excessive and that, in this context, a one-off 20 per cent cut in the level of debt is welcome'—welcome. I suspect that is what the 20,000 people in the electorate of Herbert will say as well, and the 21,000 people in the opposition leader's electorate will say as well, and the 23,000 people in the electorate of Ford, or, Mr Speaker, the 25,000 people in your electorate as well, or the almost 26,000 people in the electorate of Sturt. Because they now know that, if Labor wins, they win. And if the Liberals win—if the grinches over there win—they know that they won't.