Steph Hodgins-May (Victoria, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

Student debt in our country has spiralled out of control as people graduate with bigger and bigger debts that grow every year and take longer to pay off. Total student debt in Australia sits at a whopping $81 billion and it's holding our young people back. From western Victoria to Gippsland, I'm hearing from students across Victoria about how student debt is forcing them to juggle multiple jobs just to make ends meet. They're graduating from university and TAFE facing a decade of debt during a raging cost-of-living crisis and struggling to pay their rent or mortgage. I'm hearing about how student debt is locking people out of the housing market, how it's causing people to delay having families and how it's crushing kids' dreams of going to university. Education shouldn't be a debt sentence, but the reality in this country is that it is.

The Greens have relentlessly pushed the Albanese government, since they came to power, to deliver desperately needed student debt relief, and the pressure has worked. We have secured changes to indexation, as well as the most recent commitment to raising the minimum repayment income and cut student debt by 20 per cent after the election. This is a big win for the Greens and for all of those in the community who have pleaded and pushed for action to tackle skyrocketing student debt. Our campaign has made this progress socially and politically possible.

Sadly, Labor's tweaks to student debt won't provide relief to the millions of people struggling under the weight of ballooning debts in a cost-of-living crisis today. Labor's plan to cut 20 per cent of student debt after the election will be too little too late. People need cost-of-living relief now. The government's plan to provide student debt relief will still see student debt rise by 11½ per cent in its first term. Student debt keeps going up and up. In fact, even after these changes, student debt will have risen by over 10 per cent in Labor's first term of government.

Labor say they're wiping $3 billion from student debt, but they're just shaving a tiny bit of indexation from the top of a giant swelling debt pile—$3 billion off $78 billion is but a drop in the ocean. Let's be clear: 80 per cent of a lifetime of debt is still a lifetime of debt. Labor's rhetoric of wiping student debt simply isn't correct; its policy ambition doesn't match its social media messaging. We have thousands of students drowning in debt in a broken university system, yet we have a Prime Minister who went to university for free saying he'll scrape a little bit off your student debt—like your parents would cut the mould off a block of cheese—but only if you vote him back into government for another term.

Now, I'm not sure if there are any spaces available in politics 101, and the Prime Minister might actually have to pay for the course this time. In it, he might learn that the benches over on that side of the chamber are where the government sit. They have the ability to implement this, and we Greens are over here willing to pass it right now, because students cannot wait.

If Anthony Albanese can go to uni for free, everyone else should be able to. The young people of our country deserve to have the same opportunities as the Prime Minister had. We need an overhaul of the way that we do higher education in this country. The Greens are proud to be the party of public education. We will keep pushing and fighting to wipe all student debt and to make uni and TAFE free, unburdening almost three billion people of their debts and allowing people to keep more of their income. Free uni would boost our economy, reduce economic inequality and give countless more people the opportunity to follow their passions. Let's not forget that it wasn't that long ago that university was free in this country, and it's still free in numerous countries around the world—France, Germany, Sweden, Norway and Denmark. Student debt shouldn't be dangled like a carrot on a stick and held hostage to the next election. People are sick and tired of the political game being played with their lives. The Greens are calling on Labor to bring in a bill right now to fulfil their promise of wiping 20 per cent of student debt, like they have done for free TAFE places today.

There is no reason to wait until after the next election to legislate these changes. The Greens are ready to work with Labor to deliver these changes that will make life better for millions of people. We have the numbers in parliament to do it right now. Labor needs to get on with passing student debt relief immediately. Then we'll work with Labor to wipe all student debt and make TAFE and university free. Wiping all student debt will make real, tangible difference to so many people doing it tough, especially in a cost-of-living crisis. Wiping student debt will put money back in the pockets of people who desperately need it to make ends meet, pay rent, save for a deposit for their home and buy their medicine. Wiping student debt is the right thing to do.