Brett Mason (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Education) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Carr, Senator Stott Despoja and Senator Nettle for their contributions to the debate. For the first time in eight years, I was nearly rendered speechless but, believe me, I have recovered my composure and I am back. In terms of history—I just want to touch on this—it was the coalition governments post World War II that created the great Australian university system. Whatever Senator Carr might think about the Liberal Party, the National Party, the coalition and universities, I do not think he could call Sir Robert Menzies or Sir Paul Hasluck anti-intellectual and anti-university. They actually established Australia’s great university system. I just thought I would mention that for the record.

I pick up the point made by Senator Carr, touched on by Senator Nettle and also by Senator Stott Despoja, about Work Choices. This debate has nothing to do with the reintroduction of Australian workplace agreements in Australian universities. That is a legal impossibility. You cannot introduce by a regulation the architecture for the reintroduction of agreements that cannot be offered under Australian law. The capacity to offer AWAs in Australian law no longer exists. So let us just cut out the furphy, the misrepresentation, that this is some sort of backdoor mechanism to reintroduce AWAs into the Australian university system.

Secondly, in relation to Senator Nettle’s points about unions and so forth being involved potentially in the governing bodies of universities, I understand her point, but the protocols specifically address this point. The protocols deem the members of governing bodies of universities to be trustees so that they act in the best interests of the university, as opposed to as a representative of a specific constituency they might otherwise represent. Again, the ANU Council is a good example, where I represented the government and Senator Carr the opposition. Whether it is big business, trade unions or whatever, what the protocols demand is that everyone acts as a trustee of the university and acts in the best interests of the university and not as a representative of some other specific constituency.

Whether it be politicians or parliament in the short term, whether it be trade unions or indeed big business, that is not the point. This is all about the accountability of the expenditure of public money, billions of dollars a year, by Australian universities. That is why these national governance protocols were introduced. That is why the Australian university system helped draft them. That is why they found them useful, and that is why most of them have been complied with. This is all an absolute furphy. This is a backdoor mechanism for the trade union movement to become part of university governance bodies. I have not heard the university vice-chancellors get up in some chorus and say, ‘We welcome that.’ They do not welcome that at all, and neither does the Australian public. These national governance protocols are all about the accountability to the minister, to the Australian parliament and to the Australian people for the expenditure by Australian universities of billions of taxpayer dollars per year. It is that simple.

I look forward over the next few days to whenever the debate comes up about the substantive bill, because I will be making these points again, perhaps even more earnestly. But I am a bit disappointed with Senator Carr trying to roll the issue of Work Choices in with national governance protocols, in either a misunderstanding of or an incapacity to understand the distinction between the two issues. It is a great disappointment, and I am delighted on behalf of the opposition to be able to move this disallowance motion.

Question put:

That the motion (Senator Mason’s) be agreed to.