Australian general elections are all too frequent. Much rarer do universities figure as an election issue. Yet as the country lumbers towards its 3 May poll, they find themselves firmly in the firing line.

In an election likely to be fought largely on cost-of-living issues, higher education institutions have managed to paint themselves in all the wrong ways. They have routinely been caught out?underpaying their staff?¨C mostly casually employed PhD graduates, whose proper entitlements barely cover the rent anyway. They are seen to sentence their students to lifelong debt, as the cost of standard arts and humanities degrees reaches?A$50,000?(?23,000) and generation-high inflation indexation?washes away?a year¡¯s worth of repayments. And, all the while, executive salary scandals keep piling up.

In 2023, the University of Canberra handed a?sector-record?A$1.785 million to a vice-chancellor who had moved on under very unusual circumstances. The Australian National University¡¯s Genevieve Bell?accepted payments?from her former employer, the technology giant Intel, for the first 10 months of her A$1.1 million-a-year vice-chancellor¡¯s gig. The Australian Catholic University (ACU) paid well over a million dollars to?reverse the embarrassing appointment?of a law dean.

The election coincides with two Senate committee inquiries that have universities¡¯ executive salaries in their sights. One is looking at general governance issues in what the chair of the Education and Employment Committee, Tony Sheldon, said was becoming a ¡°lawless sector¡±. The other concerns a bill to?cut vice-chancellors¡¯ salaries by 58 per cent, on average, by pegging them to the federal treasurer¡¯s pay.

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Meanwhile, universities have been accused of ignoring the community impacts of their recruitment of hundreds of thousands of foreign students ¨C particularly on locals¡¯ access to accommodation, as rents and prices skyrocket for a vanishingly small pool of unoccupied houses and apartments in major cities.

On 6 April, the opposition coalition of the Liberal and National parties unveiled details of its long-foreshadowed crackdown on international education, in an act of campaigning one-upmanship against the governing Labor Party. ¡°We¡¯ve done an enormous amount of work on this policy,¡±??Liberal leader Peter Dutton, explaining that the coalition had opposed Labor¡¯s plan to cap international student numbers ¡°because their plan was no plan at all¡±.

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Dutton¡¯s policy would??at public universities to 115,000 a year, trumping?Labor¡¯s target of 145,000, by capping the foreign share of university commencements at ¡°around 25 per cent¡± from 2026. Currently, the proportion of international enrolments at the richest Group of Eight (Go8) universities ranges between about one-third and almost one-half.

The opposition would also increase visa application fees to A$5,000 for students enrolled at Go8 institutions, and A$2,500 for those enrolled elsewhere. Australia already has the most expensive student visa application fees in the world, after Labor?more than doubled?them to A$1,600 last July.

Claiming that international student numbers have risen by 65 per cent over the past 12 months, that when you ¡°flood the market¡± in this way, ¡°particularly into Sydney and Melbourne, you increase the cost of rentals [and] lock young Australians out of the dream of home ownership¡­Australians have been locked out of housing [while] the G8¡­made a lot of money.¡±

Dutton¡¯s claims ignored evidence that international students have only a?marginal impact on housing availability and?drive average rents down?by sharing cramped bedrooms. They also overlooked years of tacit ¨C and sometimes blatant ¨C support for overseas student recruitment by both major parties.

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In early 2022, the then coalition government?removed the 40-hour limit?on the hours student visa holders were allowed to work each fortnight, in the hope of rebooting international student flows ¨C and?easing employer concerns about labour shortages?¨C after almost two years of Covid-induced border closures. ¡°Come on down,¡± touted then Liberal immigration minister Alex Hawke, in a February 2022??welcoming the return of international students.

Some international education industry insiders were horrified, fearing a return of the visa abuse that had triggered a?harmful regulatory crackdown a?decade earlier. But the coalition government failed to fulfil its promise to review?the new arrangements, and Labor left foreign students¡¯ working hours?uncapped for another 13 months?after it won the May 2022 election.

Two months after the election, new Labor education minister Jason Clare offered ¡°a clear message to students around the world that?¡±, and he encouraged more foreign students to stay on after completing their courses to ¡°help us fill some of the chronic skills gaps in our economy¡±.

Monash University higher education expert Andrew Norton, a former adviser to 1990s Liberal education minister David Kemp, said both parties had executed ¡°spectacular¡± about-turns in their international education policies.?He said current policy settings were ¡°a total flip, from trying to promote international education to trying to scale it down as fast as possible. It is a reversal, not a modification. This is a sustained attempt to shrink it.¡±

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That view is endorsed by Universities Australia CEO Luke Sheehy, a former adviser to Labor tertiary education minister Chris Evans and shadow education minister Tanya Plibersek.

¡°We go from hot to cold,¡± he said. ¡°Five years ago, Liberal ministers [were] championing international education. Turn around¡­and Labor ministers [are] trying to cap numbers of students, and then the Liberals go one up.¡± He says international education policy in Australia is being driven by ¡°sniffing the political wins¡±.

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Peter Woelert, a higher education policy researcher at the University of Melbourne, said the election-time ¡°rhetoric¡± about universities was different in his country of birth. ¡°Germany, like some other European countries, primarily manufactures and exports goods that are based on knowledge. There is a lot of focus on R&D. In that sense, I think university education and research is seen as much more central to prosperity than in Australia, which makes a lot of its money by digging stuff up and shipping it overseas. The political narrative is always a bit different here.¡±

The ACU¡¯s Slovenian-born vice-chancellor Zlatko Skrbis said ¡°hyperventilated statements on all sides of politics¡± characterised most elections, but this campaign was worse than usual. ¡°I think the winds from the United States are giving a particular tone to¡­conversations that are happening under the banner of an election. Both parties are adjusting to the reset tone¡­that¡¯s coming from the US.¡±

¶Ù³Ü³Ù³Ù´Ç²Ô¡¯²õ??pledge to pare 41,000 staff from the federal public service??with President Trump¡¯s decision to slash the US civil service, including . Dutton also hinted that he would use federal funding to prevent students being ¡°indoctrinated¡±, citing Macquarie University¡¯s requirement for students to open presentations for a?social justice-oriented law subject?with ¡°welcome to country¡± acknowledgements of traditional Aboriginal landownership.

¡°Our position will reflect community standards in relation to what is being taught at our schools and our universities,¡± Dutton?. Greens education spokeswoman Mehreen Faruqi??the coalition¡¯s ¡°attack on academic independence. What¡¯s next ¨C Dutton personally vetting lecture notes?¡±

The Liberals have also earned??by insisting that universities crack down on pro-Palestinian protesters and adopt the?contested definition?of antisemitism promulgated by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) that even one of its drafters considers inappropriate in higher education. ¡°Academic freedom must not be used to falsely cloak incidents of antisemitism,¡±?insisted?shadow education minister Sarah Henderson.

Such sentiments sit uneasily with the coalition¡¯s full-bodied defence of academic freedom when it was last in government. Then education minister Dan Tehan hinted at?consequences?for universities that failed to align their academic freedom and free speech policies with a?model code?he had commissioned, saying he wanted an ¡°arms race of openness¡±.

¡°Free speech sounds good until it¡¯s your friends being beaten up,¡± Norton said. ¡°People are getting into trouble for their views on Israel, or at least the Gaza conflict, and the coalition is cheering it on.¡±

Referencing the pro-Palestine encampments that spread from American to Australian campuses last year, Norton said there were ¡°reasonable disputes about whether the encampments should have been cleared earlier. But I also sympathise with the v-cs in this situation. Sure, you could have got the riot police in and then it¡¯d all be gone in a couple of hours. But that would have triggered a whole lot of other problems. It is a very difficult judgement call, which probably, in hindsight, they got wrong, but it wasn¡¯t so obvious at the time.¡±

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Go8 chief executive Vicki Thomson said universities suffered from ¡°electoral irrelevance¡± until they found themselves caught up in the ¡°extremes¡± of populist debate about ¡°woke agendas¡± and migration. ¡°Our bread and butter is in the middle, [but] the only things the electorate hears are the margins,¡± she said. ¡°We¡¯ve seen the same in the UK. Both sides lurch to the populist argument, whatever that might be, without thinking of the policy consequences.¡±

Thomson said that as ¡°big institutions¡±, Go8 universities were perceived by media,?politicians?and the?general public?to be in the same ¡°box¡±?as supermarkets, placing ¡°profit before people ¨C even though we¡¯re not-for-profits¡±. She added that the ¡°tall poppy syndrome¡±?¨C the idea that the big, prestigious institutions need to be cut down to size?¨C?is ¡°not the right motivation¡± for higher education policy. ¡°The right motivation is to make sure we get the best out of our universities, to deliver the best education and research.¡±

In Thomson's view,?Australia¡¯s triennial election cycle is partly to blame for policy failings. ¡°A three-year cycle means you have the first year of a government kind of embedding itself, six months of maybe some steady-as-you-go, and then you¡¯re basically into an election context for the last 18 months. There¡¯s no longevity of policy. Things haven¡¯t worked, not because they may not have been good things but because we¡¯ve just chopped and changed.¡±

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Meanwhile, widely disparaged policies have proven remarkably resilient. Neither party, for instance, has an election policy to remove the coalition¡¯s Covid-era?Job-ready Graduates?(JRG) package. That rejigging of fees ¨C the reason for those A$50,000 humanities degrees ¨C is now almost as long-lasting as Labor¡¯s?demand-driven system, which had bipartisan support for over half a decade before it was effectively ended in 2017 by the coalition.

The coalition favours?retaining JRG, but has committed to reviewing it, as it originally planned in 2022. Labor, which criticised JRG from the outset, has outsourced any decision on reform to the?Australian Tertiary Education Commission?that it plans to establish in July. The commission was recommended by the Labor-commissioned Universities Accord and would have a large remit, including allocating funding, determining subsidy rates, developing policy, collecting data and ensuring accountability, but the coalition opposes its establishment. Norton ¨C who fears that the commission could turn into a?¡°monster¡± ¨C said 2027 was now the ¡°earliest possible time¡± for an overhaul of JRG. But, by then, ¡°a couple of cohorts of students will have gone through¡±, with ¡°long-term consequences¡± for their finances.

Evaluation expert Rachel Wilson said Australia¡¯s educational problems warranted ¡°cohesive¡± reform, from early childhood right through to adult workplace learning. However, ¡°that¡¯s probably too big a commitment for three years,¡± said the professor of social impact at the University of Technology Sydney.

Education ministers often come into office with ¡°passionate¡± reform ambitions, she said, but lost heart as they realised the scale of the problems.

¡°Can I do that in my term?¡± they asked themselves. ¡°¡®Do I want to shine a light on that now?¡¯ I suspect half a dozen recent ministers have said ¡®no¡¯ to that question.¡±

john.ross@timeshighereducation.com

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Then and now: Australian politicians¡¯ flip-flopping on higher education

Attracting international students

¡°Australia is open for business. There are more jobs¡­in Australia than before the Covid-19 pandemic. There are still many more places available to backpackers and students¡­so come on down.¡±

¨C Then Liberal immigration minister Alex Hawke, ??

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¡°When Australians can¡¯t afford a home or when rents have gone up, in part it¡¯s because international student numbers are up by 65 per cent. Universities [have] made literally billions of dollars. There has just been a complete racket.¡±

¨C Liberal leader Peter Dutton,

International post-study working

¡°Students [should] stay here and work long after they finish their studies [and] help us fill chronic skills gaps in our economy. At the moment, only 16 per cent of our international students do that. In some of the countries that we compete with for talent, it¡¯s a lot higher.¡±

¨C Labor education minister Jason Clare,

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¡°Putting a cap on the number of students that can come here in any given year is a good thing.¡±

¨C Labor education minister Jason Clare,

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Free speech

¡°The growing sense that some students at universities¡­are self-censoring out of fear they¡¯ll be shouted down or condemned for expressing sincerely held views and beliefs, or for challenging widely accepted ideas, should concern us all.¡±

¨C Then Liberal education minister Dan Tehan, ??

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¡°We will ensure disciplinary and police action is taken against [pro-Palestinian] protesters, as required, so that universities are a safe place to study and learn.¡±

¨C Liberal shadow education minister Sarah Henderson, ??

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Job-ready Graduates

¡°It is not legislation that can be salvaged with a few tweaks here and there. It is irredeemable, and the government really ought to go back to the drawing board.¡±

¨C Then Labor shadow education minister Tanya Plibersek,

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¡°The reforms that we need to implement will need to be implemented over the next few decades.¡±

¨C Labor education minister Jason Clare,

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Respect for the sector

¡°There are plenty of people who want to badmouth our universities and the people who work in them. I am not one of them and I never will be.¡±

¨C Labor education minister Jason Clare, ?

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¡°Vice-chancellors have questions to answer. There¡¯s no other job in Australia where you can be paid so exorbitantly while performing so badly.¡±

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¨C Labor chair of the Senate Education and Employment Legislation Committee, Tony Sheldon, 23 January 2025

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Major parties¡¯ higher education election policies

Labor

• Cancel 20 per cent of student debt
• Increase threshold for student loan repayments
• Simplify loan repayment arrangements
• Establish Australian Tertiary Education Commission from 1 July
• Contribute A$150 million towards a new health training centre at Flinders University
• Contribute A$80 million towards a new academy for health sciences collaborating with Central Queensland University
• Contribute A$27.5 million to fund the construction of a at CQU¡¯s Cairns campus

Coalition

• Cap at around 25 per cent of each university¡¯s overall admissions
• Raise student visa fees to A$2,500, and A$5,000 for those enrolled at Group of Eight universities
• Introduce an ¡°Australian universities performance index¡±, providing information on completion rates, student satisfaction, course quality and fees
• Reinstate ¡°50 per cent pass rule¡±, whereby bachelor¡¯s and master¡¯s students lose federal funding if they fail more than half of their courses
• Reinstate ministerial veto on Australian Research Council grants
• Require Commonwealth Remuneration Tribunal to set the salaries of public universities¡¯ vice-chancellors
• Implement a national higher education code to prevent and respond to antisemitism and compel universities to adopt International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance¡¯s definition of antisemitism
• Review Job-ready Graduates reforms
• Review temporary graduate visas
• Oppose debt forgiveness measures
• Oppose establishment of Australian Tertiary Education Commission
• Contribute A$150 million towards new health training centre at Flinders University.