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

Indeed; that is right. None of us here have a problem about giving money to any group, but I do not want my money spent on a group that does not support my interests. I repeat: there is nothing to prevent money raised compulsorily from students from being used in support of political causes. Nothing in this bill does that; nothing. Under this bill, using student funds for, for example, the Your Rights at Work campaign would be fine; that would be okay. You could not give the money to the ALP, but you could give it to the Your Rights at Work campaign. What does that mean about this bill? It means that this bill does not do what they said it would do. Money will be creamed off from students who have no interest in it and be given to groups who will use it for political purposes. You can even give the money to a union if you want to under this bill, because they are not a political party of a candidate. We could give it to the AWU, the SDA or the CFMEU. There is nothing in the bill to stop that or prohibit that. That is a distinct failing of this legislation.

I agree that while money compulsorily acquired from students could no longer be used for the PLO, as it was in my day—I am sure that Senator Conroy remembers those days; I suppose that is Hamas today—because the argument might be made that Hamas is a terrorist organisation. But what is to stop money compulsorily acquired from students being given to one of those very trendy but very violent anti-globalisations groups—those groups that go around smashing Starbucks and McDonald’s while wearing hoodies and so forth; those sorts of groups? What is to stop money compulsorily acquired from students being used for those purposes? I will tell you the answer: nothing. Sure, you cannot give it to the ALP, the Liberal Party or the National Party. But you can give it to trade unions, the Your Rights at Work campaign and all other manner of political causes. This bill does not fix that mischief, and that is its great failing. The bill missed the problem. The issue was never ever about giving money to political parties; it was all about giving money for political causes—extreme and minority causes at that.

But even with a prohibition on the direct support of political parties and candidates, one has to wonder how this prohibition will actually be policed. Neither the bill nor the guidelines made pursuant to the bill provide any credible enforcement or sanction mechanism. The bill merely states that it is up to the universities to ensure that the money is not spent on political parties and candidates without providing universities with any powers at all to enforce it. So the bill fails again. Not only does it not stop money being used for political causes but even when money is given to political parties directly there are no enforcement mechanisms for universities to enforce it. On the face of the government’s bill, it is a double failure. Even if the very narrow terms are breached, what is the process by which the bill is enforced? What are the sanctions? Who policies it? The act and the guidelines are silent on that. That is an appalling legislative failure.

Put simply, the bill does not reflect the nature of modern student life and the modern student. Except for a few aspiring Labor politicians, I know very few students who hang around universities all day in the student union. They might have 20 or 30 years ago, but they are too busy these days. Every young person I know who is studying at university is working; they have jobs. The make up of the student population today is very different. They nearly all work and they are much older.