Stephen Parry (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question before the committee is that subclause 19-67(3) on schedule 1 stand as printed.

Brett Mason (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Universities and Research) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I will draw the committee's attention to where we are up to. I had asked the Parliamentary Secretary for School Education and Workplace Relations a question in relation to subclause 19-38(4)(f). To remind the parliamentary secretary, my question was whether the phrase 'promoting the health or welfare of students' would prohibit student clubs or organisations from promoting a political cause. For example, it might be argued that the promotion of a carbon tax or a campaign such as Your Rights at Work might be for the welfare of students. So my question is: will subclause 19-38(4)(f), on the promotion of the welfare of students, prohibit the use of student moneys for that purpose?

Jacinta Collins (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for School Education and Workplace Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I remind the Senate that, on the last occasion, many questions such as this were canvassed before the Senate. I think the provisions in the clause about the health and welfare of students are fairly obvious as read. The suggestions put forward by the coalition about carbon tax and Work Choices are perhaps among some of their wilder claims about what this bill will do, such as force students into student organisations.

I take this opportunity to thank the senators who have made a contribution during this debate. The bill before the Senate amends the Higher Education Support Act 2003 to bring to an end to the damage that has been done to student services and amenities on university campuses. The bill is an important step in rebuilding key student services while retaining the government's commitment not to return—I stress that—to compulsory student unionism. The bill allows higher education providers to choose to charge a compulsory student services and amenities fee of up to $263 for 2012. Fees will be collected by higher education providers and the providers will be accountable for fee revenue. Contrary to some of the wilder claims that have been made by senators opposite, no student will be required to join a student organisation as a consequence of this bill, and the provisions in the clause that Senator Mason just referred to are pretty clear on accountability for fee revenue and its collection by higher education providers.

We heard from 17 coalition senators during the second reading stage of the bill. Further to that, six coalition senators have continued to make points during the committee stage. Some of those points have been valid; some have been wilder extensions seeking to make ideological points during the discussion. It is becoming increasingly clear that the coalition's intent is to frustrate and delay consideration of this bill. On each occasion this bill has been before the Senate, we have seen from the coalition its obstructionism aimed at delay. I hope that will not be the occasion this morning. This is not just a theoretical or ideological argument; universities will need time to get systems in place to introduce a fee in time for the 2012 academic year. They will need time to properly consult their student bodies on the proposed uses of the fee. To allow this to occur in a timely way, in a way that is consistent with the policy that the government has outlined and which the universities have relied on and supported, it is important that we bring this debate to a vote. The government's view is that students are entitled to better services when they start university next year.

Over the last fortnight the particular area of student services that was stressed to me was mental health support and counselling and the opportunity to get better support in place for the next student year. After years of ideological opposition by the Liberal Party, it is urgent that this bill be passed. I remind the chamber that on the last occasion that this was before the Senate we had eight hours and 23 minutes of debate on the second reading, including 23 speakers, and a committee discussion of seven speakers.

Brett Mason (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Universities and Research) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'm just warming up!

Jacinta Collins (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for School Education and Workplace Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would encourage Senator Mason and other senators to consider not frustrating this matter any further.

Scott Ryan (Victoria, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Small Business and Fair Competition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have some questions for the parliamentary secretary, but before that I will address some of the points she just raised. The parliamentary secretary claimed that there are accountability measures in this bill. That is not a claim that is backed up with any evidence. It is not a claim that has been demonstrated. The truth is that students will not be able to withdraw their funding from the services nor the organisations that the government or the university are levying this fee for and which the university determines to pass this fee onto. The mere repetition of slogans about accountability, the repetition that this is somehow about student services, does not actually make it so. The government has failed to demonstrate this, and that is one of the reasons this debate has gone on. There have been many questions from coalition senators, led by Senator Mason, precisely because the government has failed to answer very basic questions about this legislation.

The government has not explained how this accountability is meant to take place. How on earth is a student going to make the university accountable? They may be a part-time or off-campus student who is not able to access the services that the university chooses to levy the fee for, whether that be the ski lodge at Mount Buller which I have been heckled occasionally for raising—it is an extreme example—whether it be the cafeteria that is closed when they come onto campus at night, or whether it be the sports facilities that are closed when this student is on campus. The truth is that without the ability to withdraw the funding, without the ability to choose the way you spend your money, that accountability does not exist at the student level. The student cannot withdraw the funding from the university or simply tick a box and say, 'I don't wish to fund those particular services because I can't access them.'

You may not agree with the ideological or philosophical commitment that we on this side have to a user-pays system, the commitment to the fact that we should not be taking money from people based upon a poll tax so that regardless of your ability to pay, regardless of your means, you should be forced to pay for these services equally. We do not levy any other tax in society on that basis, yet the only argument we hear from the government is that somehow these services are so important.

The other question that we have not had answered is about the example we just heard from the parliamentary secretary of mental health. How is this not a responsibility shared by society at large? We do not levy any other group of people involved in a particular activity with a poll tax to say, 'We are going to fund these services for you.' If the government is serious about addressing mental health—and the opposition would welcome the government being serious about this—then why on earth are students not able to access the mental health services that everyone else in the community should be able to access as well?

Brett Mason (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Universities and Research) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

They are.

Scott Ryan (Victoria, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Small Business and Fair Competition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As Senator Mason says, they are. So we do not have a rationale for levying a separate poll tax. The parliamentary secretary and the government have not answered how they will protect this money from being misused. While the parliamentary secretary talks about ideology, I can talk about experience, because the experience I had at the University of Melbourne student union in the early 1990s was of money being directed towards a subsidised cafeteria and then the money coming out of that till being used for political activities. In one particular case, it famously paid for legal representation for a group called the Austudy Five who allegedly stormed parliament and broke the Premier's office window. How on earth was it in students' interests for an amenities and services fee to be directed towards the legal representation of those people? It betrays the emptiness of the claim regarding the importance of services like those for mental health.

But I do have a specific question which I am interested in. It is about the operation of the levy to pay back the deferred component of this fee. In my day it was called HECS. We would have a tax component levied essentially at a flat rate upon your taxable income. If a student accumulates a debt for the student assistance component of this fee, is that levied as a separate tax or is it simply added to what I would call a HECS debt? Is it a single levy put on someone's taxable income? My question is: are there two income levies or is it a single income levy?

Sarah Hanson-Young (SA, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We are currently still debating Greens amendment (3). I wanted to foreshadow that I will be withdrawing Greens amendments (4) and (5), so if we make a decision on amendment (3) we can then move on.

Jacinta Collins (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for School Education and Workplace Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In response to the new matter that has been raised in this discussion, I can indicate to the senator that it is added to the accumulated HELP debt.

John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have a question to the parliamentary secretary because I have some concerns. The administration will collect this levy—if you wish to call it that, Parliamentary Secretary—of $250 a head. I believe it is stated that that cannot be used for political purposes. Is it the case that the administration can distribute some of that money to the student union, who may then set up a tuckshop, for example, at the university? Is it the situation that that money can be handed to the student union to establish a business like a tuckshop, a retail outlet or whatever? Can you confirm that is the case?

Jacinta Collins (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for School Education and Workplace Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the question be now put.

Question put.

The committee divided. [12:49]

(The Chairman—Senator Parry)

Senator Evans did not vote, to compensate for the vacancy caused by the resignation of Senator Coonan.

Question agreed to

Stephen Parry (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question now is that proposed subsection 19-67(3) on schedule 1 stand as printed.

Question agreed to.

The question now is that the bill stand as printed.

Brett Mason (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Universities and Research) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We have just seen the gagging of a very important debate. This is a debate that has been fought over for about 35 years. It is a critical debate for the welfare of Australian students. What is really appalling is that the critical questions on the enforcement mechanisms of the Higher Education Legislation Amendment (Student Services and Amenities) Bill 2010 have still not been answered. I know the Minister for Employment Participation and Childcare is doing her best, but the questions about how this bill will be enforced by universities and by the department responsible have not been answered. There has not even been an attempt to answer these questions, and the Australian Greens have facilitated this gag. They did it because—I think it was Senator Brandis the other day who said this—those with an authoritarian shape of mind will do anything to close down debate.

This bill has not been thought through. I asked questions when we kicked off this morning about, in effect, the peace, order and good government of the legislation. The phrase was the 'welfare of students'. That is a very, very broad phrase. The minister was unable to tell the chamber whether that phrase would prohibit the use of money by student organisations for political causes. She could not or would not tell us. We have been asking that question now for days and yet there has been no answer. Senator Williams asked a good question—and, not that I am a good lawyer, in a sense the argument is one about the fruit of a tainted tree or the tainted fruit of a tree—which was this: 'A student operation subsidised by student money makes a profit. How then is that money to be used?' Is that covered by the legislation? In other words, can the profits of a student cafe or bar be used for political purposes? There was no answer to Senator Williams's question. It is a critical question because in effect money can be laundered through student organisations for political purposes. That is a disgrace. That is what I object to about this bill. Clearly, it is an open debate that we are having and there are strong opinions on both sides, but what I really object to is the failure of the government to answer these fundamental questions.

What about the enforcement mechanisms? How will universities enforce this legislation? Specifically, what enforcement mechanisms and penalties are available to universities to enforce this legislation? Guess what: we do not know of any. We do not know what enforcement mechanisms are available to universities—we do not have a clue. This still has not been answered. After days of debate, these fundamental questions about the utility of this bill have not been answered.

It would seem from the debate thus far—and the government is right—that you could not have money spent, for example, on bumper stickers that said 'Vote Labor'. The government is right: that would be a political purpose and would be inappropriate. It could not say 'Vote Liberal'—that is also true. But what would happen if the bumper sticker said 'Put Liberals last'. Under the bill I think that would be all right. What would happen if student money was used to support the carbon tax? Would that be money well spent? We still do not know, and that is why we oppose the authoritarian shape of mind that promotes this sort of legislation. We have no idea. So it is okay to say 'Don't vote Liberal' or 'Don't vote for the coalition', but you cannot under any circumstances say 'Vote Labor' or 'Vote Liberal'. We understand that, but it does not inhibit the scope of the legislation.

We oppose this bill and I will be saying more, I might add, on the third reading. Suffice to say that the reason we take these issues so seriously is that many of us were involved in student politics—I certainly was a long time ago back in the early 1980s—and I will never forget that as a 17-year-old my money was paid to student organisations and then used for the Palestine Liberation Organisation. That is how it was used back in the early 1980s. Somehow, that was okay; that was an expression of student will! There was never any expression of student will. Only five per cent of people ever voted at the ANU in the early 1980s. The Left got hold of the money and spent it on causes they believed in. The rest of the students—the 95 per cent—would never have supported the PLO. Yet, fundamentally, we still do not know whether this could happen again. We do not know whether, for example, money could be spent on overseas political causes or, indeed, any political issues. Those fundamental questions have not been answered. We do not know about enforcement mechanisms—we do not know how universities are going to enforce it and we do not even know what the department is going to do to monitor the situation. People might say: 'The coalition is hyperbolic about this. They are trying to filibuster the bill.' But do you know what I think? I think it is a very important issue. I think, as a matter of principle, the idea of forcing young Australians to potentially pay money for political causes that they do not believe in is outrageous. That is why we on this side have never, ever stopped in our opposition to forcing young Australians to pay for political causes they do not believe in. It is worse than that and I will say more on this during the third reading speech in a few minutes. Australian universities have changed. The demography of Australian universities has changed. It is not like it was just after World War II. Universities are no longer elite institutions. They are not even really mass institutions. They are nearly universal institutions. It is no longer like Brideshead Revisited. There are no echoes of that through universities I have worked in. Most students today are older, study part time and do not have the time or the inclination to pay for services the government and the Greens believe they should pay for. Most people at universities, most staff members among them, are working. They do not have the time or the inclination to use the services that the government and the Greens are forcing them to pay for. That is the disgrace of this bill.

Times have changed. The world has moved on. It is not like when all students were teenagers living on campus and able to use all the facilities—the gymnasiums and creches and, indeed, student organisations. What has happened—Professor Bradley in her report makes this so evident and so very clear—is that most students today, three-quarters of them, work part time. They do not have the time or the opportunity to make use of the services that this lot believe should be paid for by students. What is more, the vast majority of students today are mature-age students. This came as a surprise to me, because things have clearly changed in the 30 years since I was an undergraduate. About two-thirds of students at Australian universities are mature age; they are over 21. That is an enormous change from 30 years ago. It is a huge demographic change in the make-up of the Australian undergraduate population. Even though there are more women, more disadvantaged kids and more people working part time, this lot believe that people should be forced to pay for what the inner-city left-wing activists believe should be the priorities of Australian students. That is what we find so offensive.

The Labor Party say they speak for the disadvantaged. They always claim: 'The coalition do not care about disadvantaged students. The coalition do not speak for kids from the western suburbs of Sydney or Melbourne, or for Indigenous students or indeed for rural or regional students.' The Labor Party say, 'We care.' No, they do not. I can tell you now that the people that benefit from the expenditure of this money will be those people able to take advantage of it, and that will not be the people that work part time. Those kids who are disadvantaged will be working at the local pizza store or the local laundrette, or they will be working as a brickie's labourer or a truck driver. They will not be sitting in student unions collecting their pay cheques and spending money on fashionable left-wing activist causes. They will be working. Apparently the Labor Party speak for Indigenous students. Those kids will be out working. They will not be sitting on university campuses lolling in the bright afterglow of a 21st century Brideshead Revisited. That is not going to happen. The world has changed under the foot of the Left in this country and they do not quite get it.

In a few years 40 per cent of young Australians will be going to university. That is two out of five. The vast majority of them, three-quarters of them, will be working. Two-thirds of them will be studying part time and an increasing number will be studying externally using modern technology. How are they going to take advantage of the great facilities they are going to be forced to pay for? The Labor Party do not care about that. They argue that they speak for the underprivileged. It is the coalition that speak for those students that work part time, the vast majority of whom cannot take advantage of the services that they are expected to pay for. The coalition speak for young Australians that have to work. We speak for them, not this lot. They do not speak for them. The government are forcing kids that have to work or indeed study part time to pay the bill. We speak for those kids that work when they go to uni and we speak for part-time students. We speak for those kids that have no alternative except to work to put themselves through university. What is this lot doing about that? Absolutely nothing. What about kids from rural and regional Australia that have no alternative except to pay their own way? This lot know they do not have access to those services. Australian universities and their make-up have changed under the foot of the Australian Labor Party.

This is an issue I know many people find arcane and perhaps even slightly overbearing at times. But this is such an important issue to the coalition. I want to make this point and I will make it again shortly. This is such a critical issue because none of us on this side of the chamber believe that any student, any young Australian, should have money compulsorily exacted from them and used for purposes they cannot or will not use. As Senator Cormann, Senator Humphries, Senator Fifield and many of my friends have said in the course of this debate, 'We have no problem—students can spend their money on any political cause they want.' None of us have any objection to that. But they will not spend the money of young Australians on political causes we find distasteful or, in my case, as you will remember, Temporary Chairman, abhorrent. Any of us that went to university over the last 20 or 30 years are so attuned to the potential horrors of this legislation that we cannot allow this bill to go through without a fight. Let me say this, because the government have not answered the legitimate questions that coalition senators have raised: we will be doing everything to monitor how this legislation is implemented and how it is monitored.

Nick Xenophon (SA, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise for two reasons. Firstly, I want to correct the record in relation to the last vote. The division was on whether the question be put. In error, I assumed that it was a vote on an amendment to the legislation, which I supported. I apologise for that. I was in the middle of a committee meeting. My vote was in error, and I bear the responsibility for that—although I note that it would not have changed the outcome, because as a general principle I am always loath to support what is effectively a guillotine. I do note that this debate has been going for some time—

Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, it has not.

Nick Xenophon (SA, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No, Senator Cormann. I want to make it clear that my true voting intention was not to support that the question be put in relation to the division, but the outcome would not have been different. Having said that, I still support the government's legislation, for the reasons I outlined in my contribution to the second reading debate. I think it is important to point out that the Howard government, when it introduced this legislation, did set aside a specific fund—I think it was about $100 million—to make up for the loss of facilities and loss of services. Also, vice-chancellors across the country have expressed dismay about the impact VSU has had on campus facilities. To me, this is a pragmatic way to deal with those problems. It is legislation that I do support. I believe there are sufficient safeguards in it to ensure that it is not abused and that universities have control over it. For those reasons I still support the legislation, but I do want to make it clear that it was not my intention to support a guillotining of the further debate of this bill.

Jacinta Collins (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for School Education and Workplace Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the question now be put.

The Committee divided. [13:14]

(The Chairman—Senator Parry)

Senator Evans did not vote, to compensate for the vacancy caused by the resignation of Senator Coonan.

Question agreed to.

Stephen Parry (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question now is that the bill stand as printed.

Question agreed to.

Bill agreed to.

Bill reported without amendments; report adopted.