Policy & Research Briefing Note - Federal Election 2016
Major Political Parties Tertiary Education and Research Policies
(as at 20 May 2016)
The following is a comprehensive overview of the tertiary education related policy for the
three major political parties (the Coalition, the ALP and the Greens) for the 2016 Federal
Election.
Note: This information will be updated during the course of the election campaign should any
further announcements be made by these parties.
Contact:
For further information please contact:
Terri MacDonald, Policy and Research Officer, ([email protected])
Higher Education Policy Overview – Major Political Parties, 2016 Federal Election. 1
Coalition Government (Australian Liberal Party & the Australian Nationals)
Higher Education
In terms of Higher Education the Government has deferred to offer up a policy platform,
choosing to instead release a discussion paper entitled Driving Innovation, Fairness and
Excellence in Australian Higher Education1 - and thus delay making decisions until after the
July 2016 election with implementation of any policies to be delayed until 1 January 2018.
The options paper is intended “to guide the consultation process with the sector” and while
floating a range of alternative measures” which, while abandoning complete deregulation,
would still see substantial fee rises. Indeed, from the options paper t is clearly evident that a
re-elected Coalition government would actively pursue its agenda of reducing public funding
to higher education by shifting more of the cost burden to students, but not necessarily by
the exact policies mechanisms originally proposed by former Education Minister Christopher
Pyne in the 2014 Budget. This having been said, the polices must fit within the
government’s Budget envelope of providing $2.5billion in savings over the forward
estimates.
The broad brush framework for this approach is evident in the 2016 Federal Budget. The
most obvious aspect being the $2b savings from higher education, although it far from
straightforward how this is made up (for a more detailed analysis see Impact of 2016 Budget
on Universities Briefing Note).
Savings measures
The Budget does however identify some clear cuts to the Higher Education Participation and
Partnerships Program (HEPP) reduced by $152 million to a total $553 million over four
years. The Office of Learning and Teaching has also been abolished, with the resulting $18
million in savings going to TEQSA and the Quality Indicators in Learning and Teaching
website.
Cutting public Investment
In the absence of any specific announcements it is appropriate to review the policy positions
outlined discussion paper, which for the most part continues the agenda laid out in the 2014
1 See https://docs.education.gov.au/documents/driving-innovation-fairness-and-excellence-australian-education
Higher Education Policy Overview – Major Political Parties, 2016 Federal Election. 2
budget. In this, the government maintains its 20 per cent funding cut which students will
bear on top of a reduction in per-student government grants. The outcome would be a shift
in the share of cost burden to students to about 50-50. Students will also likely be hit by a
reduction in the income threshold at which they start repaying their Higher Education Loans
Payment (HELP) debt (down to $40,000 from $54 126), and perhaps also be hit with a loan
fee of between 5-20 per cent.
Making students pay more
While the Coalition abandoned the unwinnable position of complete fee deregulation in the
Budget, the discussion paper proposes a form of partial fee deregulation that allows
universities to charge whatever they wish for ‘flagship’ courses. Given that these would
have been the most likely candidates for $100,000 tuition fees under complete deregulation,
this change appears to be largely superficial and appears that the Federal Government is
seeking to implement its deeply unpopular deregulation of fees through the policy back door.
The Government’s goal of innovation and differentiation between universities sits behind this
agenda.
Furthermore, the non-flagship courses would see a substantial increase in fees by a
substantial lifting of caps on fees to compensate for cuts to public funding. A 20% average
cut to funding would require average fees to increase by at least 25%.
Reining cost of HELP
The discussion paper also floats a number of proposals for recouping debt from students
who don’t repay any or all of their HELP debt, including not allowing retirees access to the
loans scheme to undertake ‘recreational’ degrees; introducing a household income test in an
attempt to get repayments from ‘wealthy’ mothers who work part-time or not at all; and -
recouping debt from deceased estates2. While a lifetime cap on how HELP debt that could
be borrowed should stay, there is a proposal that the amount could be refreshed as students
pay off debt to encourage lifelong learning (but would also renew their debt).
Expansion of Commonwealth supported places
2 The majority of HELP debt related recommendations appear to be lifted from the Grattan Institute’s publication HELP for the future – Fairer repayment of student debt (March 2016) http://grattan.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/968-HELP-for-the-future.pdf. The P&R Unit has undertaken analysis of the recommendations of this report in our soon to be released discussion paper in the impact of proposed HELP-HECs changes on women.
Higher Education Policy Overview – Major Political Parties, 2016 Federal Election. 3
The Discussion paper leaves the door open on the issues such as extending government
subsidies to private higher education providers and expanding the number of pathway and
sub-bachelor places, but it should be noted that there remains a clear push in their suite of
policy proposals towards deregulation and privatisation.
Summary of Higher Education Policy
In summary the Governments higher education policy can be summarised as one that seeks
to:
reduce public investment in higher education, and
make students pay more.
VET & TAFES
The federal government has proposed a set of tougher measures in their discussion paper,
Redesigning VET Fee HELP (released on 29 April) in a last ditch attempt to deal with the
unsustainable VET FEE-HELP blow-out. This paper calls for a full redesign of the scheme,
noting the scale of unrestrained malpractice by private providers who have used unethical
and possibly illegal recruitment strategies as they seek to gauge out as much profit from the
public purse as possible.
The discussion paper proposes a series of measures to improve the integrity of the system,
which can be seen as the Coalition’s platform on reforming VET:
The application of minimum eligibility requirements for VET FEE-HELP recipients.
Reducing the lifetime student loan limit from $99,389.
Placing a funding cap on the scheme overall
Prioritising VET FEE-HELP funding to courses that align with industry needs or lead to
employment outcomes.
Providing better information for VET FEE-HELP eligible students before they enrol.
Establishing a VET FEE-HELP ombudsman.
Redesigning the regulatory oversight of VET FEE-HELP, giving the Commonwealth
more power to tie payments to compliance measures.
Consideration of different payment tests around student engagement, progression and
completion.
The possibility of existing providers needing to reapply.
Higher Education Policy Overview – Major Political Parties, 2016 Federal Election. 4
It is worth noting however, that many of the recommendations made in the paper were
amendments which Labor moved to implement in late 2015 and which the government voted
down.
Research and Innovation
In November 2015, Turnbull announced the Coalition’s Innovation Agenda. In terms of
universities, Education Minister Simon Birmingham announced new investment in national
scale research infrastructure under the National Innovation and Science Agenda of $2.3b
over 10 years, including $1.5b for the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure
Strategy (NCRIS). This supports collaboration between researchers, government and
industry, with a view to commercialisation of research.
Also allocated is $127m to establish the Research Support Programme and Research
Training Programme for universities. This is part of new research funding arrangements for
universities (which incorporates the RSP and the RTP funding) effectively replacing the
current framework of six research block grants with these two programmes:
The Research Support programme will provide around $885 million in 2017 to
Australian universities as a ‘flexible’ funding stream to support the systemic costs of
research.
The Research Training programme will provide around $948 million in 2017 to
support domestic and international higher degree by research (HDR) students.
Research income from competitive grants will continue to drive funding allocation to
support research.
Engagement will be measured by research income from industry and other end-
users. Publication track record remains an important indicator of research quality
which is recognised in competitive grants and rankings.
Student HDR completions will remain as an important measure in determining
Research Training funding amounts
$9m will be allocated to measure the impact and engagement of university research, to be
conducted by the Australian Research Council (ARC) as a companion exercise with the
Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) assessment (pilot to take place in 2017).
Higher Education Policy Overview – Major Political Parties, 2016 Federal Election. 5
$13m over five years to encourage women to choose to stay in STEM research, STEM start-
ups and STEM orientated businesses.
Other initiatives are aimed at fast tracking collaboration between business interests and
researchers, with tax incentives provided to businesses for innovation and research,
particularly in STEM areas (biomedicine, agriculture, cyber security, advanced computing
etc). The current ARC Linkage Projects scheme will also be changed so that it is open to
new applications continually, instead of the annual rounds, to better suit business and
industry collaboration.
International Education
The government has provided $12 million in the Budget to fund its National Strategy for
International Education 2025 (released on 30 April). The strategy is in 3 parts:
The National Strategy for International Education 2025 is a “whole-of-sector”
approach and sets out a 10-year plan for further developing Australia’s position as a
“global leader in education and training”. The national strategy is based around three
pillars: “strengthening the fundamentals”; “making transformative partnerships” and
“competing globally.”
The Australian International Education 2025 (AIE2025) market development roadmap, provides a 10-year market development framework for Australia’s
education exports, including “game-changing” strategies to build scalable,
collaborative networks of education providers, attract capital to fuel the sector’s
expansion, and target key markets abroad.
The Australia Global Alumni Engagement Strategy 2016-2020 outlines a five-year
plan to strengthen and engage Australia’s foreign alumni in order to improve
diplomatic access and influence and building trade and investment links.
However, close reading reveals that the strategy is full of generalised goals, motherhood
statements and policy platitudes, with very little detail on how these are to be achieved.
There is a stated intent of growing the international student market but doesn’t detail how
this is to be achieved in any detail, although there is much referencing to online modes of
teaching and learning, the potential to grow enrolments in the regions and the school sector,
and that universities and business should be focusing on international education
partnerships on and offshore.
Higher Education Policy Overview – Major Political Parties, 2016 Federal Election. 6
The Australian Labor Party (ALP)
Higher Education
In September 2015 the ALP released its higher education policy platform. In it, the ALP
stated that if elected it would:
Increase the number of students completing their study by 20,000 graduates a year
from 2020, but will also introduced incentives around retention and completion.
Replace the existing Higher Education Participation Program (HEPP) with a Higher Education Access and Growth Strategy targeted at improving access for low
income students, students for rural and regional areas, Indigenous Australian and
migrant students, students with disabilities and from disadvantaged background.
There would be a focus on student outcomes, including completion.
Provide more information to parents and students, such as average salary and
career options on graduation, so they can make better decisions about university
selection.
Introduce via legislation a new Student Funding Guarantee which would be indexed,
investing an on average an additional $9,000 per student for a standard 3-year
degree. Under this, the ALP would see the average funding per student at $11,800;
then in 2018 a boost of funding per student would see this rise by more than 27 per
cent ($2500); by 2026 the guarantee would see universities more than 40 per cent or
$4,000 better off per student each year in government funding compared to the
Coalition Government’s policy. The Student Funding Guarantee would include
additional funding to reverse the Government’s Budget cuts
Prioritise study in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) with a
range of incentives that includes an offer to write off the HECS debts of 100,000
students who complete a STEM degree at university.
Provide TEQSA with an additional $31 million to better regulate the quality of
teaching and resourcing in our universities
Establish an independent Higher Education Productivity and Performance
Commission which will focus on accountability, performance and university
productivity, as a mechanism to ensure the production of graduates meet the needs
of the future economy.
Offer a Startup Year at university to young Australians looking to start their own
enterprise.
Higher Education Policy Overview – Major Political Parties, 2016 Federal Election. 8
Boost the number of young Australians taking up STEM courses at university as well
as upskilling 25,000 teachers.
These measures would be part of a White/Green Paper consultation process with the sector,
which would be introduced shortly after taking office.
The ALP’s policy is opposed to the deregulation of tuition fees, and would offset the cost of
the Higher Education Package (estimated at $2.5b over forward estimates) by not
proceeding with the following Coalition Government initiatives:
Expansion of the demand-driven system to sub-bachelor places and to bachelor
places at non-university higher education providers;
Abolishing FEE–HELP and VET FEE–HELP loan fees; and
Establishment of the Structural Adjustment Fund promised to help regional
universities adjust to a deregulated system.
The additional expenditure will be offset, over the forward estimates and the medium-term,
by existing commitments to reform the taxation of multinational entities and superannuation
tax concessions, and the abolition of the Emissions Reduction Fund.
VET & TAFES
If elected Labor would hold a comprehensive review of the vocational education and training sector – equivalent to the landmark Gonski Review into school funding and the
Bradley Review of higher education (and first since the Kangan Report in 1974). In
addition, the ALP has undertaken “to back TAFE into the future by developing a
comprehensive National Priority Plan that defines the unique role of TAFE as our public
provider and delivers on this by working with the states and territories to provide ongoing
guaranteed TAFE funding”.
Labor has already undertaken to:
Establish a VET Ombudsman;
Cap tuition fees in line with how university fees are set;
Lower the lifetime limit for VET FEE-HELP loans to half the current amount;
Require loan applications for students to be handled by the department rather than a
private college or broker;
Higher Education Policy Overview – Major Political Parties, 2016 Federal Election. 9
Ban or place restriction on brokers;
Provide the Minister with the power to suspend payments to a private college under
investigation.
Cap HELP at $8,000 annually, although there would be provision for an exemption
on legitimate high-cost courses such as nursing and engineering following ministerial
approval. (Government data shows that the average cost of a diploma almost tripled
from $4814 in 2012 to $12,308 in 2014, with Information technology diplomas cost an
average $18,735 a year, hospitality diplomas $16,982 and management diplomas
$15,493. By way of contrast, the annual student fee for a degree in law or commerce
in 2016 is $10440.)
Research & Innovation
Although the ALP is yet to announce its policy on research matters, in 2015 the party
released its “Innovation reforms” which committed it to:
1. Accelerating regional innovation via Regional Innovation Hubs;
2. Structural reform through Innovate Australia;
3. Improve the flow of capital to startups through Startup Capital; and
4. Supporting the “best and brightest overseas” through a Landing Pad for Australian
innovators.
This third wave of innovation policy initiatives also builds on Labor’s previous
announcements, including measures to boost science, technology, engineering and maths
(STEM) skills, increase access to venture capital to commercialise great Australian ideas
and support local start-ups. It also incorporates policy in Schools, TAFE, Higher Education,
Investment and workforce initiatives, including the following:
co-investing in early stage and high potential companies through the $500
million Smart Investment Fund.
Bringing together the superannuation, venture capital and startup sectors in
an Innovation Investment Partnership to identify barriers holding back investment in
Australian-based venture capital funds and early-stage enterprises.
Improving access to finance for startups and micro-businesses through a partial
guarantee scheme, Startup Finance.
Higher Education Policy Overview – Major Political Parties, 2016 Federal Election. 10
Getting startups to help solve government problems through Challenge
Platforms and support startups to compete in government tenders.
Supporting 100,000 young people, especially women, to Study STEM by writing off
their debts on completion.
Putting more focus on quality and completion at university with around 20,000 more
graduates each year and Student Funding Guarantee.
Developing a National Digital Workforce Plan (ALP states that 100,000 more ICT
workers will be needed by 2020).
Create two new visa classes, offering 4,000 visas, to attract international talent to
help develop Australia’s growing startup ecosystem.
Creating a new Startup Year at universities to help students commercialise their
ideas.
Boosting the skills of 25,000 current primary and high school teachers to Teach
STEM.
Teaching scholarships for 25,000 science, technology, engineering and mathematics
graduates.
Giving every child the opportunity to Learn Code or computational skills at primary
and secondary school.
Working with industry to establish a $9 million National Coding In Schools centre to
develop the resources and expertise required.
International Education
The ALP has promised $2m to boost the number of international students in Tasmania as
part of an incentive package aimed at improving Tasmania’s economy. Further policy
around international education is yet to be announced.
Higher Education Policy Overview – Major Political Parties, 2016 Federal Election. 11
The Australian Greens
Higher Education
The Australian Greens support free, well-funded and high quality, life-long education and
training. Their policy platform on Higher Education is part of the Lifetime of Learning policy,
which outlines their support for schools, students with a disability and the tertiary sector.
The Lifetime of Learning policy states that Greens oppose any moves to increase fees for
students and would invest $1.4 billion per annum to:
reduce students’ fees and associated HELP costs by 20%, and
reinstate the Student Start-Up Scholarships as a grant
The Greens state that their Lifetime of Learning package has been fully costed by the
Parliamentary Budget Office at $1.403 billion per annum, over the forward estimates. They
state that their policy, however, will be cost neutral, using a continuation the Coalition’s
‘deficit levy’ on a permanent basis for those earning over $180,000 per year to raise an
additional $1.55 billion per annum to offset the increased costs over the forward estimates.
VET & TAFES
The Greens support a VET system with TAFE at its core and the provision of affordable
education and training of quality. The Greens believe that the current funding model needs
to be abandoned with priority given to supporting the public TAFE system. In order to
restore TAFES as the central component in the VET system, the Greens would3:
1. Abandon the failed market contestability model by reversing the trend of public funds
flowing away from TAFE to private for-profit providers and reinstate core public funding to
TAFE as the primary provider of VET in Victoria including ongoing funding for capital works,
facilities, equipment and funding for community service obligations;
2. Enforce minimum teaching qualification requirements for all VET providers and minimum
supervised hours of delivery and appropriate practical components for all courses that
3 The policy is located at Greens Victoria (http://greens.org.au/initiatives/vic/standing-tafe) but the premise of returning TAFE as the centre of the VET system is referred to in statements by federal Greens when responding to the Coalition and ALP’s national policies on VET.
Higher Education Policy Overview – Major Political Parties, 2016 Federal Election. 12
receive government subsidies; and
3. Establish a panel of eminent persons to assess the impacts of the contestable VET
funding model and funding cuts over the last five years on the viability of TAFE; the quality,
accessibility and affordability of vocational education and training; and to propose a
sustainable model that maximises the public benefit.
Higher Education Policy Overview – Major Political Parties, 2016 Federal Election. 13
Research & Development
The Greens research and development policy will increase science and research funding to
3% of GDP by 2025 and 4% of GDP by 2030. This commitment is supported by the Green’s
policy to reverse cuts to universities and boost base funding by 10%, which the party
believes would see R&D investment reach their target of 3% of GDP by 2025, if not earlier.
This was outlined in the Greens Securing Our Future Through Research and Development
plan, which commits the party to:
A ‘Protecting Science’ package, consisting of a combined $847.9 million boost to the
Australia Research Council, National Health & Medical Research Council,
Cooperative Research Centres;
Restoring funding to the CSIRO and preventing job cuts ($306.5m);
Funding for indirect costs associated with research ($201.2m);
Further steps towards default 5 year grants in ARC and NHMRC;
Reverse short-sighted Government cuts to the Sustainable Research Excellence
program and boost university research ($1,306 m);
Investment in critical infrastructure via Innovation and Science Australia ($422.6m);
Investment in strategic opportunities for international collaboration ($43.4m);
Additional funding for the Future Fellowships scheme to attract and retain top
research talents ($297.2m);
Open Access Publishing of Government funded research ($197.7m);
Support for women in science ($213.7m);
Supporting collaborative health research centres to translate the research
discoveries into clinical practice ($171.9m);
Support the ongoing development of the Medical Research Future Fund; and
Reverse cuts to R&D tax offsets ($690m).
The boost to R&D outlined in their plan would be funded from announced revenue measures
by the Greens, including the abolition of fossil fuel subsidies (the Greens have projected that
abolishing one such subsidy alone, the fuel tax credit rebate, would save the budget at least
$4.5 billion a year).
Importantly, the Greens have identified the need to provide a stable and dependable
research funding framework that ends the rolling funding shortfalls that has seen the majority
of the research workforce employed on continuous short to medium term contracts, with
Higher Education Policy Overview – Major Political Parties, 2016 Federal Election. 14
corresponding high levels of insecure employment. In order to address this, the Greens
would request that the ARC and NHMRC develop ‘proven capacity’ guidelines to guide the
distribution of their Future Science funds. Researchers and organisations with ‘proven
capacity’ in their fields would be eligible to apply for funding to allow them to continue
research in that field. This would not only relieve experienced researchers of the need to
spend resources on repeated project-based grants, but it would also provide more secure
employment and better pathways for early- and mid-career researchers, including for those
researchers who may be less likely to secure ARC/NHMRC funding in their own right; The
ARC and NHMRC would be asked to do further work in considering the impacts of moving to
a default 5-year grant term. Whilst the Greens support the principle of longer funding cycles,
and although the Parliamentary Budget Office has advised it would have no meaningful
impact on the federal Budget, they state that they would seek advice from the sector as to
any impact it would have on the number of successful grants awarded and on the sector
more broadly.
In addition to reversing the funding cuts to university research (injecting $1.306b over the
forward estimates) the Greens would ensure that funding is holistic and supports all capital,
maintenance and operating costs. Their plan is to cover the indirect costs of research, such
as administration, equipment and staff, although they also state that more systemic changes
need to be made to the way that indirect research costs are funded. They have also
committed $50 million per year in grants to research and innovation organisations to assist in
the development of strategic programs to help retain female workers and carers as they
manage competing demands on their time. These programs may include part-time
fellowships, childcare support, family friendly facilities or increased technical support while
on maternity leave.
In relation to international research, the Greens have committed to an additional $43.4m
over the next 4 years towards strategic opportunities for international collaboration to bring
funding in the area up to almost $80 million. This will enable greater support for:
early to mid-career researchers to establish partnerships with international
leaders in their field, building the networks Australia needs for future innovation;
Collaborative innovation projects to deliver industry and economic benefit for
Australia through research links with overseas companies and facilities; and
Strategic partnerships determined by existing government priorities and
cooperation agreements, supplementing and aligned with existing bilateral
Higher Education Policy Overview – Major Political Parties, 2016 Federal Election. 15
strategic partnership for India and China and the landing pads identified in the
innovation strategy.
Also of interest is the Greens commitment to drive the development and implementation of a
national program of Open Access Publishing ($197.7 m), to be undertaken in collaboration
with major academic institutions, research bodies and publishing houses and cover the fees
associated with publication of research arising from an ARC or NHMRC supported project.
This will help ensure that publically funded research is freely available to researchers,
business and the wider community.
More information at www.greens.org.au/research.
Innovation
The Greens have also released a separate Innovation Policy intended to support start up
enterprises, focus on STEM education and boost innovation funding. Central to this policy is
setting a 3% innovation investment target for the Future Fund, which would see around $15b
invested into the innovation sector over four years. This would also support a $678.9m
investment over the same period aimed at increasing the uptake of Science, Technology,
Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) studies at both schools and universities (and links in
with the Women in STEM policy noted under their research policy platform).
International Education
Under their New Economy plan, the Greens note the need for a “vibrant education sector” for
both domestic and international students. Their 2016 Budget Principles policy supports the
growth of key sectors including education and services along with advanced manufacturing,
tourism, agriculture and clean energy. In a number of (unspecified) sectors that Greens
would set 15 year growth targets.
Higher Education Policy Overview – Major Political Parties, 2016 Federal Election. 16