UK general election, ATEC, ESOS Bill: Latest rundown of higher education
From the Chief Executive Officer?
It’s election season! I have been keeping a close eye today on the UK general election results and, as widely predicted, the Labour Party has ended 14 years in the wilderness of opposition and return to office with a clear majority. There is a cautious optimism that a change of government could bring some much-needed stability to the UK’s university sector, which is experiencing many of the same issues being felt in Australia – financial pressures chief among them. As I mentioned last week, Keir Starmer’s administration is expected to launch a review of the sector which is a good first step in bringing forward reform.?
Speaking of reform, we have continued our work this week on a sector response to the Government’s proposed shape and direction of the Australian Tertiary Education Commission and Managed Growth Funding System. These are major items of work, and they have our full focus. The UA Board will meet soon to consider the principles to guide our feedback and I look forward to engaging fully with all our members thereafter to ensure we present a clear and unified response to help shape the final structure of both the ATEC and new funding system. We are yet to see the final paper in this series, on needs-based funding, but I’m told it is not far off.?
It has been a frantic final week of the winter Parliamentary sitting period. The Government, among its various other priorities, introduced legislation to support its Future Made in Australia agenda. In welcoming this, we reinforced the key role our sector has in supporting the agenda, with skills and research central to its success. The Government has acknowledged this, but actions are more important than words and we need greater funding and policy stability to continue these tasks. The crackdown on international students is providing anything but stability, serving only to destabilise universities at a time we are being asked to do more. We need a strong and robust university system to deliver opportunities, success and prosperity for all Australians, including through the delivery of a Future Made in Australia, and I will be continuing to remind government of the consequences of rushed policy responses to political issues at every opportunity.?
Remaining on international education, the ESOS Bill featured briefly in the House of Representatives this week, but it did not progress to the Senate. This is pleasing, given the Senate committee scrutinising the legislation won’t report for another six weeks. Our submission to the committee was lodged on Monday but our work here is far from over. We will be pulling every lever we can over the coming two months to ensure the final shape of the legislation is reasonable and practical. This will include strong engagement with the Senate crossbench, as well as joint advocacy activities with the business, technology and tourism sectors. The first in our series of roundtables we are co-hosting with the Student Accommodation Council also occurred today in Sydney and we have further meetings in Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide next week. We are bringing our sectors together in response to the Government’s new policy direction in international education, which of course captures student accommodation. I will keep you all updated on all our work!?
Finally, Senator Henderson’s bill to establish a judicial inquiry into antisemitism at universities received government backing this week and will now be examined by the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee (reporting by 4 October 2024). This issue has been a major focus in the parliament over the last few months and I think our sector can approach this process confident in the way we have responded to the activities we have seen on campuses. UA will be engaging closely with the committee, and I would like to offer UA’s full support to all our members who may be called to appear at public hearings.?
I’ll leave it there for today. I hope you all have a great weekend!?
Chief Executive Officer, Universities Australia
Parliamentary update
Chief Economist's update?
The number of Beds in Purpose Build Student Accommodation (PBSA) grew by an estimated 36 per cent from 2019 to 2023. The number of onshore international students in higher education is estimated to have fallen slightly over this time.?
Given the sharp increase in PBSA availability, and the weak growth in student demand, is likely the pressure international students in our sector have placed on private rentals is significantly lower than it was pre-COVID.?
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Our media activity in the last fortnight generated over 59 mentions and reached a potential audience of more than 2 million people across online, print, radio and television platforms.?
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