policy & reform
Caps, fees and alternative funding
Take a closer look at Minister Pyne’ s call for a review of higher education. By Louis White
It is hard to get a grip on what Education Minister Christopher Pyne wants from his latest review into the higher education system. Pyne’ s short term in office seems to have been riddled with jumps from one position to another. So what to make of his announcement that former Liberal education minister David Kemp and Grattan Institute higher education program director Andrew Norton will review the university funding system?
For starters, there has been widespread speculation that Pyne wants to scrap student union services fees and bring back caps on university places( see box, page 16).
The Gillard government abolished caps on the number of Commonwealth-supported university places, helping just under 200,000 students attend university. Some sectors within the industry have criticised this change, stating that quality is being diminished.
It seems unlikely, however, that Norton and Kemp would side with these critics. Norton released a report in August on behalf of the Grattan Institute titled, Keep the caps off! Student access and choice in higher education.
The paper states emphatically that the system is working:“ It is lifting the supply of graduates to Australia’ s economy, increasing student choice and improving access to higher education for disadvantaged groups.
“ The old system of government allocating student places to universities was unresponsive to student demand. With uncapping, universities are responsive to student demand trends in science, health and engineering by providing student places.”
Based on this, it is hard to see how he would backflip, especially when he concludes,“ It would be a policy tragedy to recap university places now. It would make Australia’ s higher education system less fair, less efficient and less productive.”
Kemp and Norton have also worked together before. The latter was an education adviser to the former during his stint as federal education minister. That makes the emergence of a surprise recommendation seem even less likely.
Not all universities support Norton’ s position, of course. The Group of Eight are among the uncapped system’ s detractors, as professor Fred Hilmer, vice-chancellor of the University of New South Wales, explains.
“ I welcomed the government’ s decision to review the demanddriven system,” Hilmer says.“ There is legitimate concern about a potential decline in standards and escalating costs as a result
14 | campusreview. com. au