Michael Ronaldson (Victoria, Liberal Party, Shadow Special Minister of State) Share this | Hansard source

I do want to refer back to the comments I made just before question time. With the leave of the Senate, I want to go back to about 1992 when I was the federal member for Ballarat. I remember that a couple came down from the top end of my electorate. We sat down and they said, ‘We’ve got a problem, Mr Ronaldson.’

We talked about their problem, and it was that they had three children; from recollection, one was 16, one was 14 and one was eight or nine. They said, ‘You are a parent, and you have got younger children such as we have?’ I did. They said: ‘We have to make a decision about which one of our children is going to go on to higher education. Can you imagine how difficult it is for us as parents to be making a decision about which of our children, who are aged between eight and 16, are going to go on to higher education? What would you do?’

This couple were remarkably calm, given the magnitude of the task that lay ahead of them. I said: ‘I don’t know what I would do in your situation. I will be confronted with the same decision that you are making, but I live in Ballarat and I suspect that my income is probably more than yours is, so while there might be some financial difficulties for me, they pale into insignificance compared to the issues that are going to confront you.’

This couple made the decision that their second child was going to be the one who would get that higher education. They went to the school to discuss with the teachers which of those children was likely to be the one who would benefit most. This was Australia in 1992, where parents were making decisions on the back of their financial position to make a determination about which of their children was going to get the chance that city kids did not have an issue with—there was no issue about a choice for them. That was 1992.

In 2009, while this bit of legislation might be innocuous in its title, it is actually taking us back to a situation where those parents in 2009 are going to be making the same decision about which of their children, potentially, will get a higher education. If this was a wealthy country in 1992, it is a far wealthier country in 2009, and yet we are putting parents in a position where they will have to make that decision.

I think there is a lack of understanding, I suspect, about the financial set up of many country families. On paper it looks all right because of the assets.