Kim Carr (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister Assisting the Leader for Science) Share this | Hansard source

I do that because it might help the minister understand the importance of these issues of which his colleagues obviously do appreciate. But it has not sunk in. This very principle of the importance of universities in Australia winning major contracts and providing the central thrust for our science and research effort in this country has just not registered. At the same time, of course, this is a government that the very next day seeks to debate in this chamber a proposal to abolish the fund that actually ensures that these sorts of projects go ahead.

Of course, it is not just the universities that will suffer. The Education Investment Fund has been a great benefit to the CSIRO. That may well be a problem for this government given the hostility this government has shown to the CSIRO. It may well be that this is yet another one of its cunning plans to do great damage to our scientific infrastructure. It was the fund that we used to actually provide the new deep-sea research vessel, the Southern Surveyor. Without EIF, this nation would be left without the capacity to carry out our marine and ocean research—our blue-water research capacity.

The minister has appointed a working party to look at this. There have simply been no answers to the way in which we can ensure future funding arrangements, unless there is provision made—you actually have to do something and not just have good intentions or just make an assertion that you are interested when all of the evidence and all of the facts point to exactly the opposite.

The last budget that this government brought down highlighted its intentions. It was where it put its actions on the line rather than its statements. We saw during the election campaign that commitments were being made which are clearly being breached. This is yet another example of the way in which commitments that this country so desperately needs—to ensure that our universities are able to sustain their capabilities and to ensure that our universities are not placed in the position that they cannot provide the capabilities that we need to ensure the prosperity for this country—are being breached.

I know that the real opportunity for the government here is to allow this bill to go through in its full, which will in turn lead to the universities having to undertake even more drastic actions in regard to the privatisation of their efforts. The consequences are simple: this is a country that will be poorer as a result of this government's policy positions. That is why it is so critical for us in this Senate to weigh up carefully what is being said to us by this government, to reject the proposals that the government is making and to support the amendments. Because, without systematic and sustained funding in our research infrastructure, this nation will not be able to prosper and Australia will not be able to attract the very best and very brightest in the world. That is what we are doing with the investments that we are making in terms of our long-term commitment to research into commercialisation of research.

The abolition of the Education Investment Fund is an ill-considered decision by a government that does not understand the consequences of treating the research community in this way. You simply cannot treat the research community in a way of just turning on and off the tap of government support. That is why these amendments are being moved. This government's proposal is a demonstration of a wilful neglect to the fundamental principle of being able to provide this country with the necessity of ensuring that our universities, our scientific agencies and our TAFE colleges have the funding support they need to be able to provide the basic infrastructure they need to be able to ensure that this country is able to maintain its prosperity. I urge all senators to support these amendments.