Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Education and Training) Share this | Hansard source

Senator McKenzie is right. Go down that path, the type of path that Senator Carr is proposing, and it is most likely that it will be the disadvantaged who miss out. In particular, it will be the disadvantaged who miss out, because, built into our reform package, is greater opportunity for people who may not automatically make it into university—in terms of pathways programs and the opportunity to undertake diplomas. If this bill does not pass, around 80,000 students will miss out on Commonwealth support each year by 2018—35,000 of them at the bachelor level through the proposal to expand the level of Commonwealth support in terms of the range of institutions, and 48,000 who would be studying diplomas, advanced diplomas and associate degrees, valuable pathway courses for people to access undergraduate places in future. These are the things we stand to lose because those opposite will not engage in a constructive conversation or have already latched themselves onto and wedded themselves to Senator Carr's proposal to roll back to the days where government knows best, sets the caps on university places and tells universities how many people they can accept into what course. That is not acceptable to us.

We believe these have been good reforms, but they need to be underpinned by sound finances in the future. We believe that the model we have presented gives that opportunity to ensure that nobody will face an up-front fee and nobody will face a tax, contrary to what you will hear from those opposite. Every Australian will still have the opportunity, if they qualify, to be accepted to a university place under which they need not pay a cent up-front. They will continue to receive significant Commonwealth support, but the universities will also be able to access funding because of a flexible fee structure and because people, when they earn more through their lives, will be paying a contribution back to the university system. That is the important thing with the fairness here. We are asking those who benefit from the university system to help fund it in future, not those who miss out.