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

I will quickly indicate that the government does not support these amendments. Frankly, it is bad enough that the Senate has just proposed that a large part of the market will continue to effectively operate under the VET FEE-HELP scheme for the next 12 months, which is something that the government does not support and will continue to oppose. But these amendments from NXT would delay commencement altogether of the scheme, ensuring that the VET FEE-HELP scheme itself did continue to operate for a prolonged period of time, which would see yet more waste of taxpayer dollars, targeting of vulnerable Australians and damage to the reputation of the vocational education sector.