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

I thank Senator Reynolds for her question. Senator Reynolds is from the state for Western Australia, which, pretty much like every other Australian state, is a world leader when it comes to the provision of high-quality education services that are valued not just in Australia but by students from around the world in terms of their access to those education services. The Tans-Pacific Partnership Agreement seeks to follow the government's strong work to date in strengthening our international education markets and providing greater opportunity for schools, universities, vocational education and training providers and English language service providers to all continue to grow the international education market, our third-largest export market and our largest services export product overall. And there were important wins in the Trans-Pacific Partnership for education services with guaranteed access to most TPP markets, where there are significant new opportunities for online learning; for universities and vocational institutions to expand into that online learning space. There will be opportunities to offer a wider range of courses, particularly to Vietnamese students, including in new and emerging technical disciplines and there will be opportunities to seek to establish or expand campuses or institutions by Australian universities or vocational providers with commitments under the TPP for Brunei, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Peru and Vietnam that lock in openness and access for those providers.

Similarly, there will be greater opportunities in the school education space for international school services operated by Australian providers to have greater access in these TPP countries, all of which are actually delivering opportunities for us to grow a key export market that improves our education services in Australia and that grows more jobs and wealth for all Australians. (Time expired)