Malcolm Roberts (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Hansard source

As a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia, I support the government's changes to university funding. Firstly, we agree with the government's general thrust. Secondly, we want to go further and ensure responsibility among students and reduce the taxpayer load. Thirdly, we want to restore accountability and academic freedom in universities, to make our universities better so that our future students will emerge better.

So let's get to the government's thrust. The Higher Education Support Amendment (Job-Ready Graduates and Supporting Regional and Remote Students) Bill 2020 reduces fees for courses that meet needs for future jobs and more practical jobs like engineering, nursing and teaching. We support that. It will make these courses more affordable. It raises fees through humanities courses—and I will explain later why that is so effective. Humanities graduates are not getting jobs right now. The government's thrust focuses taxpayer funds on needed skills, and that is good for our country.

The second point I want to discuss is that we need to go further to ensure responsibility among students and to reduce taxpayer load. The current HECS debt is $65 billion and growing rapidly. That's the outstanding HECS debt. With Australia's national debt now pushing $1 trillion, the repaid HECS money could be used productively. We believe that we need to reinstate the 10 per cent discount for fees paid up-front. People who can afford university do not need the concessional interest rate and, as things stand, do not start repaying debt until they are earning an annual income of $46,620. Financially it is better value for the government and for taxpayers—and we do represent taxpayers—to have a loan paid up-front at a discount than paid out over 10-plus years. On average, it takes about 10 years for a student to repay a HECS debt. We need to reduce the threshold for repaying HECS debts, based on data and fairness to students and fairness to taxpayers. Remember them? They are the people who are paying our salaries, the people who run this country. We need to limit student entitlement to seven years full-time equivalent and stop people on fee-free university education with little or no chance of a job. Students cannot continue to live off the taxpayer forever. We've got to get job-ready graduates. We have a duty to protect taxpayers, our nation and our community, as well as protecting students.

The third area is restoring accountability and academic freedom in universities. Universities monitor students' academic progress. Students who repeatedly fail—for example, they do not pass more than half of the subjects—should stop getting FEE-HELP. This removes a fee-free career for university students who keep failing. We also need students to be aware of what they are getting from taxpayers' money, and we need job-ready graduates.

I can give you some examples of universities suppressing free speech. Dr Peter Ridd was sacked from his position at James Cook University for being critical of poor quality reef science. He was fulfilling his duty as a scientist to challenge his colleagues and he was sacked. The recent Senate inquiry in Queensland vindicated him when academics admitted facts and data that revealed the Queensland state Labor government does not have the facts to support its recent reef regulations. Peter Ridd was correct. The late Professor Bob Carter, well known globally as a fine scientist and paleoclimatologist, was prevented and hindered from speaking by James Cook University. Just recently, here at the ANU, Dr Howard Brady, a noted geologist who understands climate extremely well, was invited by staff at the ANU to make a presentation on why the study of climate science has gone wrong. After the notice was sent out, ANU prohibited him from delivering that seminar. But here's a welcome sign from ANU: professors and staff at ANU were so disgusted with the ANU's response that they joined together, and Dr Brady will now be conducting his seminar later this month. They've given him immense publicity internationally. He's received support from University of Sydney staff, from the ANU staff, from other universities within Australia and from overseas universities, including Princeton.

The former High Court Chief Justice Robert French recommended in his government commissioned review of free speech at Australian universities that academic freedoms be protected so data and research can be put forward. That's a scientist's responsibility. Justice French recommended that, as part of academic freedom, academics should be allowed to 'make lawful public comment on any issue in their personal capacities'. Universities allow, indeed encourage, far-left Marxists, anarchists, socialists and communists to speak freely on university campuses yet do nothing to stop these same fascists shutting down lecturers with whom they disagree. In not protecting free speech of all voices, universities are complicit in the suppression of free speech.

I went to the University of Queensland, where I was awarded a master's in business administration. I'm very proud to say that the dean of that university just recently, a few years ago, welcomed students with a note saying, 'There are no safe spaces at the University of Chicago.' Basically, he was saying: 'Suck it up. Discuss and debate freely.' That's what universities were about. That's what they need to get back to being about. Recently, I was listening to a regional university vice-chancellor, who suddenly admitted to me that the capital city unis have fouled their nests because of their craving for political correctness and their fear of upsetting people. The media reported Professor Ridd as saying he supported 'any moves to improve the disastrous situation at the moment where academic freedom of speech effectively does not exist'. He also said:

At present universities are applying their vague codes of conduct on top of academic freedom of speech—this means academics have to be 'respectful' and 'collegiate'.

'Any robust debate,' he points out, 'is likely to seem disrespectful to somebody,' so that is a way of shutting down debate. That's how universities that fear, or are too gutless to ensure, academic freedom suppress academic freedom and free speech.

We need practical graduates. My three years underground as a coalface miner after graduation were priceless for me. I left university and then realised I had better go and learn something, so I worked underground at the coalface for three to four years. We also need to remember, in addition to practical experience, that universities are not for everyone and should not be for everyone. We need to rekindle trades, rekindle the TAFE, rekindle apprenticeships. Senator Hanson has been leading the way in Australia in rekindling apprenticeships, and the government took her policy two years ago and implemented it.

We also need to stop political correctness at TAFE and get it back on track. We're very pleased to see that the government is undertaking a major shake-up of university fees in a bid to steer students towards fields where there are skills shortages and jobs for the future, and it's better for students after graduation. University graduates have been slamming universities for meaningless degrees that have left students with dismal career prospects and crippling debt. While a university degree leads some students to a bright future, for others it currently leaves them with nothing but debt and disappointment.

I want to take a break here because I want to answer some comments from Senator Murray Watt. His comments disrespect university students and universities, and his fabrications require me to respond. He said:

Senator Hanson and Senator Roberts … since they entered this parliament, line up with the LNP to pass legislation …

Let's see who lines up with the LNP. Let's, indeed, have a good look at this. On climate policies, Liberal and Labor are similar. They believe the nonsense. On energy policies, Liberal and Labor both believe in the Renewable Energy Target. Both believe in stealing farmers' property rights—as they have both done. Liberal and Labor both believe in gold-plating the networks. Liberal and Labour both believe in the National Electricity Market that has turned into a national electricity racket. One Nation opposes all of those. On water, the Turnbull-Howard Water Act 2007 is supported by Labor. Now some Liberals are waking up and some Nats are waking up. One Nation opposes the Water Act 2007 and the destruction it's caused across the Murray-Darling Basin. With electricity prices, as I've just said, Labor and Liberal support the Renewable Energy Target. They support subsidies to the intermittent, unreliable energy sources of wind and solar. They support privatisation. They support the National Electricity Market, which is a national electricity racket. Both are anticoal in their actions. The only difference between Liberal and Labor is that Liberals are positive in their talk, but not their actions. Labor and Liberal have been killing our fishing industry. With foreign ownership, Liberal and Labor have sold out the Port of Darwin and other companies and water rights in our country. There is record debt, state and federal, and Labor and Liberal join on this. With infrastructure, there is a lack of infrastructure and neglect. With taxes, foreign multinationals are tax free. Labor and Liberal have enabled that over the last six decades. I could go on, but you can get the point that Liberal and Labor are actually closer than One Nation and Labor or One Nation and the LNP.

The second point Senator Watt talked about was, in his words:

… One Nation candidates out there masquerading as the people who are standing up for battlers in our community.

Let's go through some of the candidates: Michael Blaxland at Gympie, Sharon Lohse at Maryborough and Sharon Bell. Here's a good example: Sharon Bell. She's a real fighter. She's a working class girl who's come up and is now working in the construction industry. She is fighting the member for Bundamba, who was parachuted in from a union position in Melbourne. He was parachuted into Queensland outside the Bundamba electorate, and then, two months before the recent by-election, he moved into Bundamba. And he's doing nothing. What did the Labor Party do? They got rid of Jo-Ann Millar, a first-class, true Labor member of parliament, and replaced her with this blow-in, parachuted-in person from Melbourne. Then I could talk about Deb Lawson; Christine Keys, who wants to restore solid education; Wade Rothery, a coalminer in Keppel; Torin O'Brien; and Stephen Andrew, an electrician who has such a good rapport with the people in his electorate of Mirani—he is member of parliament. These are the types of people that One Nation is very, very proud to say stand with us. And they are fed up with the tired, old parties, both Liberal and Labor, and so are an increasing number of voters. That's why these candidates are standing up—because they're sick and tired of the Liberal-Nationals and sick and tired of Labor. They have been abandoned by both the tired, old parties. Labor and the LNP actually make battlers.

Senator Watt talked about us standing up for battlers. That's correct. And the reason we have to do that is because the Labour Party is creating battlers. It's taking the middle class and making them poor. It's making them poor and making life tougher for the poor. Look at your energy policies. Look at your agriculture policies. People are coming to One Nation because people need someone in this parliament who stands up for them and someone in state parliament who stands up for them. Senator Watt said:

Senator Hanson and her party … come down to Canberra and they vote with the Liberal and National parties …

It's not us who have the policies that are the same. It's not us; it's you guys. Let's have a look at what Senator Watt said. We've seen—