Alby Schultz (Hume, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I say to the former speaker: spoken like a true union hack. I rise to speak on the Higher Education Legislation Amendment (Student Services and Amenities, and Other Measures) Bill 2009. The last time I spoke on this matter was when the then Howard government introduced an amendment to abolish compulsory student fees, which was passed by the parliament in December 2005. It should be of no surprise to members of this House that I as a former meatworker and a person experienced on the issue of compulsory unionism again rise to speak against the proposal of the Rudd Labor government to reintroduce such fees that place an added drain on the limited resource of funds that are available to the majority of students that attend university throughout Australia.

This bill proposes to amend the Higher Education Support Act 2003 to allow higher education providers to charge students an annual capped compulsory student services and amenities fee from 1 July 2009; to introduce a new Higher Education Loan Program category for student amenities fees called Services and Amenities HELP, or SA-HELP; to broaden the application of the Higher Education Loan Program category for vocational education and training students, called VET FEE-HELP; and to provide that officers of tertiary admissions centres have the same status and duty of care as those of higher education providers in relation to processing student information.

Whilst I acknowledge that this bill does contain certain other measures, its primary purpose is, from 1 July this year, to allow higher education providers to impose a new tax on the one million university students attending universities across the nation, whether they are full time, part time, studying on campus or externally. Whether or not they have a need for the services and activities which the $250 fee is intended to prop up, they will all be hit with what amounts to a new, compulsory annual $250 tax, equating to $250 million around the nation taken from students, who can least afford it. The services which may be funded by the compulsory levied fee will be outlined in the Student Services and Amenities Fee Guidelines, which will be tabled in the form of a disallowable instrument after the bill has been passed.

The bill will also require higher education providers to comply with the new Student Services, Amenities, Representation and Advocacy Guidelines. These guidelines will impose obligations on the provider to comply with requirements relating to so-called student representation and advocacy, effectively funding student elections, union offices and salaries. As is the case with the fee guidelines, these guidelines will be tabled in the form of a disallowable instrument after the bill has been passed.

The bill also makes a number of technical changes that will allow students to defer payment of the compulsory fee by accessing a HECS-style loan under a new component of the Higher Education Loan Program called SA-HELP. The bill will include tertiary admissions centres in the regime that governs higher education providers’ access and use of student records and information. The bill will also expand the VET FEE-HELP program to increase the number of students who can access the program. Currently only full-fee-paying students are covered. The bill will make changes to expand the types of courses included in the program—that is, diploma courses that do not provide for the transfer of credits to an approved course.

The Rudd Labor government has yet again broken another election promise because it did not include the introduction of a higher education amenities fee in the policies that it took to the last election. Research that I have conducted supports voluntary student unionism and further can provide evidence that voluntary student unionism, commonly referred to as VSU, is working. The RMIT Student Union asserts on its website that voluntary student unionism has led to its advocacy service being scaled back, yet it still finds the money to produce an expensive radio program on 3CR every Saturday morning called Blazing Textbooks—

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