Education policy shifts from bipartisan to radical

221
Within weeks of election in September 2013 the Abbott government
launched processes of review designed to inform the government’s
first budget, including commitments to education. In part consistent with, but
also departing from the outcomes of these reviews and the anticipated timelines
for major change, the 2014 Budget became the Abbott government’s vehicle for
announcingapackageofradicalchangestopotentiallyderegulatehighereducation
in Australia. Education commentator, Dr Gavin Moodie, astutely observed at the
timethat‘IfthegovernmentcangetitsproposalspasttheSenate,Australiawillrun
an unprecedented experiment in fee and place deregulation with few constraints
and little direct experience to inform policy analysis and institutional strategy’
(Moodie 2014). Moodie identified the three most significant changes proposed
as: extending the demand driven system to all providers of all higher education
qualifications; removing caps on student fees; and introducing fees for research
higher degrees. He might also have added proposed changes to interest rates on
tuitiondebt,acomponentoftheproposedreformpackagethatwaslateramended,
butonlyafterconsiderablepoliticalcapitalhadbeenlost.
This chapter focuses on the background, impact and media critique of
this major higher education policy reform agenda but also draws on parallel
developments in schooling policy where relevant.
Chapter 10
Education policy: from bipartisan
promises to radical agendas
Sharon Bell and Belinda Probert

222 From Abbott to Turnbull
A program for reforming education
Following the budget announcements, the Minister for Education,
Christopher Pyne explained why major reform of higher education was
necessary. He argued for the need for a reform package to ‘spread opportunity’
and ‘stay competitive’ in a context of ‘cut-throat’ international competition and
‘disruptive technologies’. The Minister reiterated the aspiration for Australia to
‘create some of the best universities in the world and the best higher education
system in the world’ generating skills and knowledge for the ‘jobs of the future’.
He presented a stark challenge: ‘either we spread access to higher education to
more Australians and keep our country competitive with others in our region,
or we support a higher education system that is unsustainable, that will decline
into mediocrity, and eventually be left behind.’ The Minister argued that it
would be irresponsible and cowardly of him not to act as the higher education
and research system was widely acknowledged as ‘unsustainable in its current
form’ and he called on the Senate cross-benchers’ support in addressing the
emergent challenges (Pyne 2014a, 1).
StudentswereidentifiedbyPyneasbeneficiariesofproposedreforms,with
anestimated80000morestudentseachyeartobeabletoaccesscommonwealth
support under the proposed changes. ‘Innovative partnerships’ would increase
‘lower cost opportunities’ for rural, regional and outer metropolitan students
and students from disadvantaged backgrounds would have access to a new
Commonwealth Scholarship Scheme, with ‘individual packages’ to meet their
needs (Pyne 2014a, 5).
Butforstudentstherewasastinginthetail.TheMinisterforeshadowed
a significant shift in graduate contributions, from approximately 40 to 50
percent noting the significant, private benefits of higher education such
as higher levels of employment, higher average earnings, better health and
greater longevity (Pyne 2014a, 2). The government also proposed to cut
research training funding and allow introduction of charges for research
degrees, initially at a modest level. Although the proposed research degree

Education policy: from bipartisan promises to radical agendas 223
fees were modest they marked a change in conceptualisation of research
student status and contribution. Students undertaking research degrees
have long been acknowledged as not just engaged in learning/developing
the skills and knowledge of professional independent researchers, but also
as essential contributors to, if not the powerhouse of, Australia’s research
system (CAPA 2008, 8).
The Minister also presented the case for the extension of support for
students studying for higher education qualifications at TAFEs and private
educational institutions. This also applied to those studying for sub-bachelor
qualifications (diplomas, advanced diplomas and associate degrees) and those
undertaking pathway programs to higher education (Pyne 2014a, 3).
Pyne cited support for the deregulation proposals from a ‘raft of
university leaders’ in order to ‘free our universities to meet the challenges of
the 21st century’ (Pyne 2014a, 4). Institutional freedom was a centerpiece
of the reform package: freedom to respond to the changing environment;
freedom to operate in the modern world economy without unnecessary
constraints; freedom to work to institutional strengths; and freedom to
position themselves. Universities would be free to decide what they offer, what
fees they charge, which students they aim to attract, what teaching methods
they use, what scholarships they provide, and what support services they offer
(Pyne 2014a, 1–6).
In addition to freedom and institutional autonomy, central to Pyne’s
agendawastoensurethattherecentlyintroducedDemandDrivenSystem1
that
lifted previously imposed limits on the funding of bachelor-degree students at
public universities, did not ‘lower standards’. For this he cited similar concerns
expressed by Australia’s longest serving conservative Prime Minister Sir
Robert Menzies, notably from times characterised by a small, highly selective
and elite higher education system2
. Prior to the 2014 Budget announcements,
the Minister also spent a great deal of time apparently looking backwards in
acknowledging Menzies as the ‘father of modern higher education in Australia’
and drawing comparisons with Menzies’ achievements and the task ahead

in terms of growth of the sector, standards and institutional freedom. Much
of this was repeated in the Second Reading Speech of the Higher Education
and Reform Amendment Bill (Pyne 2014b, 2014c). But Pyne was not looking
to reproduce the past. As the 2014 Budget announcements were to reveal,
the Minister was about to pursue ‘new frontiers’ and embark on a free market
reform agenda with no historical precedent in higher education in Australia.
To aid his reform task, Pyne was arguably operating in a highly developed
policy environment and this, together with a pessimistic outlook in relation to
any possible increases in government funding, undoubtedly influenced the initial
positioning of many vice-chancellors. As public debate gained momentum the
imperatives were cogently summarised by Vice Chancellor Glyn Davis (2015)
who noted that since the mid-70s all recent governments had cut university
funding per student in real terms but the public perception remained that
universities are adequately funded and, due to growth of the sector, governments
are able to point to growing overall public expenditure on tertiary education.
It was not just in higher education but in all levels of education that the
Abbott government commenced with a potentially strong policy framework. At
the school level, after several decades on the agenda, a National Curriculum had
been agreed with the first stages to commence in 2013 alongside a National Plan
for School Improvement (NPSI) grounded in the Gonski Review of Funding
for Schooling (2011) which addressed performance issues, particularly for the
lowestperformingstudents,andproposedanequitableschoolfundingsystem.In
higher education, the framework for development of a coherent and sustainable
tertiary education system was set by the Bradley Review (2008), and the Base
Funding Review (Lomax-Smith 2011) that arose as a recommendation from the
Bradley Review. However, both Labor and Coalition governments were faced
with significant and systemic funding challenges.
The fiscal challenge has been a dominant feature of policy debates. The
expectation of significantly increased participation in tertiary education was a
key,andwidelyaccepted,outcomeofthe2008BradleyReview,whichreferenced
50 percent targets for participation in higher education in OECD countries.

The target set for Australia was 40 percent of 25–34 year olds and twenty
percent of students from disadvantaged groups by 2020 (Bradley et al., xi, xvii).
The ensuing ‘demand driven system’, formally introduced in 2012 but pre-
empted by many tertiary institutions, was immediately successful in increasing
student numbers with every public university in Australia increasing the
number of commonwealth supported students between 2009 and 2012 (Kemp
and Norton 2014, ix).
The previous Rudd and Gillard Labor governments had left a legacy of
very thorough policy reviews that had been generated through significant
sectoral and community consultation and input. Their legacy was an evidence-
based policy framework coupled with high levels of negotiated support by the
states and key stakeholders but with significant funding and implementation
challenges. It was already apparent in the 2013 Labor Budget that higher
education was to take heavy cuts (an efficiency dividend for university funding
of two percent in 2014 and 1.25 percent in 2015), in part at least to help cover
the costs of the government’s Gonski school funding plan (Grattan 2013).
The role of the Base Funding Review, commissioned under the Gillard
government was to ‘establish enduring principles to underpin public
investment in higher education’ and to address ‘the appropriate balance
between public and private contributions towards the costs of undergraduate
and postgraduate education’ in the context of the change from a capped
allocation system, concomitant rapid growth in higher education attainment
rates and improved enrolment rates of those from disadvantaged backgrounds.
The Review concluded that there was a demonstrated need to increase the base
funding per place to improve the quality of higher education teaching and
address areas of underfunding in a suite of identified disciplines. The Review
also recommended that the balance of student and government contributions
should be set at the 40:60 ratios for each commonwealth supported place
(Lomax-Smith et al. 2011).
There were also a number of highly relevant specialist reviews to inform
government policy, such as the Knight Review of the Student Visa Program

(Knight 2011), Professor Kwong Lee Dow’s Review of Student Income
Support Reforms (Dow 2011) and the Behrendt Review (2012) that set clear
blueprints for the future of Indigenous access and outcomes for Aboriginal
and Torres Strait Islander People in higher education.
It was the Bradley and Gonski reviews that set the benchmarks for
Australia’s evolving education system—a system that has been characterised
by ‘fair and inclusive practices that strive for equity, quality and high
completion rates for upper secondary and tertiary education (OECD 2013,
4). Both were very thorough policy reviews with an unusually high level of
support of all major stakeholders but both involved a significant focus on
equity and expansion, and required significant additional investment. The
Gillard government was already perceived to have privileged the school
reform agenda over higher education funding.
By 2013 in higher education Australia was grappling with both short term
funding issues in the context of balancing the budget and issues similar to
those emerging throughout the OECD—the expectation and need to support
‘lifelong learning’ not just for a minority/elite but through the development
of a universal higher education system (Trow 2007). This was coupled with an
increasingly sophisticated understanding of the importance of early childhood
education and the early and formative years of schooling (COAG 2009, 4).
Schools policy had long been recognised as politically pressing, and although
a state rather than commonwealth responsibility, there was ample opportunity
for the federal government to intervene and shape school policy, especially
when using a funding package to leverage change3
.
FromthetimeofthereleaseoftheGonskiReviewofFundingforSchooling,
the Coalition had been opposed to the new funding model. In pre-election
mode then education spokesperson Christopher Pyne had been an outspoken
critic of the Gonski funding model. But on the eve of the 2013 election, Abbott
announced that ‘As far as school funding is concerned Kevin Rudd and I are on
a unity ticket’ promising the same increase as Labor in school funding over the
next four years. It was a promise that turned out to be short lived (Allard 2013).

A similarly benign position was presented to the sector in relation to higher
education. Prior to his election, Tony Abbott drew on the Menzies tradition
and values later embraced with such enthusiasm by Minister Pyne: institutional
autonomy, academic freedom including the freedom to speak ‘truth to power’,
the role of universities to produce excellent graduates, leaders and future
professionals. At least one university commentator was tempted to conclude
‘he gets it’ (Sharrock 2013). In the context of fiscal constraint and responsible
budget management, Abbott promised no substantial new funding but also no
substantial funding cuts or major policy changes. He indicated that universities
needed time to adjust to the impact of the demand driven system introduced the
previous year. He spoke of a ‘hands-off’ approach to the higher education sector
saying‘Thereislittlethatgovernmentcancontributeexceptinterference.Higher
education is one area where government’s role is more to be a respectful listener
than a hands on manager’ (Hurst 2013). In a reassuring move for many, Abbott
emphasised the need for policy stability and his desire to build on the sector’s
success, particularly in international education. He did however flag, in a move
that became more significant over the ensuing months, that if the Coalition were
elected they would not take up the key recommendation of the Base Funding
Review to increase base funding to the higher education sector. He did not
couple this position with plans to deregulate domestic student fees.
The dramatic shift from the pre-election promises of Abbott and Pyne,
broadly the ‘unity ticket’ on school education and a ‘hands-off ’ approach
in higher education, to the deregulation of higher education articulated
in the May 2014 Budget followed by a retraction from Gonski funding
and recommendations, together with a review of the National Curriculum
for schools, raises the question of ‘what changed’? What were the drivers
for radical departures from established policy and highly regarded review
recommendations? Why embark on a toxic political move that has generated
heated debate, student protests, institutional uncertainty, community
anxiety over costs and quality of education, research sustainability and
policy paralysis for over two years.4

Pressing imperatives
A key plank of the Abbott government’s election campaign was the capacity
to bring the national budget back into surplus (Liberal Party of Australia 2013,
16–17). To inform the Coalition’s 2014 Budget, a National Commission of
Audit (NCOA) was formed on 22 October 2013 to review and report on
the performance, functions and roles of the commonwealth government, and
make recommendations to return the budget to a sustainable surplus of one
percent of GDP prior to 2023–24.
The NCOA was headed by Tony Shepherd, former Business Council of
Australia (BCA) president, in which role he had been openly critical of previous
Labor government policies including the Gonski schools funding reforms
(Wright 2014). The NCOA made 86 recommendations in its reports (February
and March 2014) and proposed sweeping spending cuts for government
consideration, many of which were relevant to education and are outlined below.
Schools funding
The NCOA recommended changing funding arrangements to simplify
commonwealth-state responsibilities and make school funding more
affordable by transferring all policy and funding responsibility for government
and non-government schools to the states, with annual funding provided in
three separate, non-transferrable pools—one each for government schools,
Catholic schools and Independent schools. It also concluded that the growth
in commonwealth funding of schools, attendant upon the implementation
of the Gonski reforms, was not sufficiently justified. With these reforms the
NCOA proposed significantly reducing the size of the Commonwealth
Department of Education (NCOA 2014, 124–7).
Higher education
The NCOA recommended a number of changes be made to existing
arrangements to ‘better account for the private benefits of higher education
and improve performance of the sector’ including decreasing the average

Education policy: from bipartisan promises to radical agendas229
proportion of higher education costs paid by the commonwealth through
the Commonwealth Grants Scheme from 59 percent to 45 percent and
increasing the average proportion of costs paid by students from 41 percent
to 55 percent; tasking the Minister for Education with developing options
to increase competition in Australia’s education system through a partial or
full deregulation of fees for bachelor degrees; and reducing the cost to the
commonwealth of the Higher Education Loan Programme (HELP) by
increasing the interest rate applying to HELP loans from the current rate
(equal to movements in the CPI) to a rate which reflects the full cost to the
commonwealth of making the loan and reducing the threshold for HELP
repayment from $51 309 per year to the minimum wage of $32 354 (NCOA
2014, 153–7). The NCOA reported that ‘A number of universities made
submissions with the Commission proposing the complete uncapping of fees’
(NCOA 2014, 154).
Research
The NCOA recommended the government take a more strategic, whole-of-
government approach to the funding of research and development, including
by abolishing sector-specific research and development programs; aligning the
Australian Research Council and the National Health and Medical Research
Council grant processes; streamlining the current system of research block
grants and postgraduate scholarships and looking at options for better aligning
funding for the direct and indirect costs of research; and allowing for more
government oversight of the work of the Commonwealth Scientific and
Industrial Research Organisation to ensure that resources are being directed
to areas of greatest priority (NCOA 2014, 168–72).
A month after assembling the Commission of National Audit, the Abbott
government also commissioned a Review of the Demand Driven Funding
System to ‘recommend possible areas for improvement to ensure that the
system better meets its objectives, is efficient, is fiscally sustainable, and supports
innovationandcompetitionineducationdelivery’(KempandNorton2014,81).

The report examined the impact of the system on the quality of teaching and
future graduates and whether quality was being maintained, especially for less
academicallywell-preparedstudents.Overallthereportdocumentedthesuccess
ofthedemanddrivensystemandshouldhavealleviatedMinisterPyne’sconcerns
about quality and innovation in a significantly expanding sector. The reviewers
noted that almost all submissions to the review supported the continuation of
the demand driven system. Access was found to be improved for students from
all categories, including students from major cities, rural and remote areas, all
socio-economic backgrounds and Indigenous students. Innovation, teaching
quality and student satisfaction also improved and the early evidence suggested
the system seemed to be adapting more to skills shortages (Kemp and Norton
2014, xiii). The review generated a number of influential recommendations. It
proposed extending the system to all approved higher education providers and
sub-bachelor higher education courses. Recognising the financial pressures on
government that the Review findings generated, the reviewers recommended,
consistent with the NCOA, adjusting the commonwealth place subsidy and
studentcontributions,togetherwiththeintroductionofaHELPloanfee(Kemp
and Norton 2014, xiv).
In light of the failure of the higher education reform package in the
Senate, Pyne emphasised that ‘The truth is that fee flexibility is the only
way that Australia will be able to achieve a world class higher education
system—one that caters to the growing and increasingly diverse student
population and is characterised by excellence in teaching and research’
(Pyne 2015).
Pyne did not make reference to the fact that a partial or full deregulation
of fees for bachelor degrees was a recommendation of the NCOA nor did he
attempt to reconcile the fact that this was not a recommendation consistent
with the Demand Driven Funding Review. In fact, the Commission of Audit
explicitly referenced the Demand Driven Funding Review in relation to this
recommendation on deregulation, recommending a twelve-month reporting
period for the Minister (NCOA 2014, 157).

But the government was impatient to prosecute the deregulation
agenda and instead used the 2014 Budget as the vehicle for so doing. Why
did the Minister so radically depart from the Demand Driven Funding
Review’s recommendations and why did he act with such haste to move to
deregulation of the sector?
First, despite student protests and increasingly vociferous opposition
byuniversitystaff,theMinisterenjoyedtheunfailingsupportofUniversities
Australia ‘the voice of Australia’s universities’5
. This was frequently
misleadingly reported in the media as the ‘sector’s support’ when in reality
it was a position supported by the majority of vice-chancellors who on this
issue stood apart from their constituencies6
. The vice-chancellors’ support
was a powerful impetus for attempting to push the reforms through quickly
and continued until the bill was defeated for the second time in the Senate.
Although the incoming Chair of Universities Australia clearly signaled
a more considered sectoral position on deregulation7
it was not until
the end of March 2015, when the powerful Group of Eight universities
withdrew their support, that a changed position was absolutely clear (Hare
and Trounsen 2015).
Second, while addressing the budget deficit was a clear priority, the Abbott
government’s broad agenda may also have been strongly influenced by well
informed and influential bureaucrats and aligned with the conservative right.
A persistent theme in Pyne’s rhetoric, and one that goes hand in hand with the
imperative to deregulate fees, was the risk that Australia was falling behind the
rest of the world in developing a ‘world class system.’ This was a well-developed
theme of Pyne’s senior adviser on higher education, Dr Don Markwell, who
has argued for over a decade that ‘there is a need for radical change if Australian
universities are not to fall further and further behind the world’s best’8
.
Add to the policy mix, the Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) a free market
think tank ‘dedicated to preserving and strengthening the foundations of
economic and political freedom’, outlined an agenda, provocatively titled
Be like Gough: 75 Radical Ideas to transform Australia for Tony Abbott to

‘secure his place in history’ as a transformative (potential) Prime Minister.
Tony Abbott had publicly acknowledged this agenda as aligned with his
own thinking, with ‘a big yes to many of the 75 specific policies you urged on
me’. Of the ‘75 Radical Ideas to transform Australia’, and the additional 25
proposed later, eight proposed reforms focused on educational and research
reform, including ‘fee competition’ in higher education (IPA 2012).
Fig 10.1
Source: Pope, The Canberra Times, 23 June 2016.
Policy failure
For Abbott and Pyne, neo-liberal agendas were one component of a toxic
combination of fiscal and ideological imperatives that they doggedly pursued
despite growing public concern and political opposition in a highly flawed
public policy process. They had failed to flag their intention to make major
policy and funding changes to either higher education or to schooling
before the election. They established a National Commission of Audit with
a composition that called in to question its ‘independence’ and provided
an impossibly short time frame for reporting given the scope of savings
Source: Pope, The Canberra Times, 23 June 2016.

targeted. They commissioned the Review of the Demand Driven System but
with narrow terms of reference and again with an impossibly short timeline.
They prematurely piled big structural reforms in to the budget without an
appropriate consultative process that would have generated expert scrutiny
and greater public understanding, perhaps avoiding some of the important
‘unintended consequences’ of proposed educational reform, in particular those
that would impact disproportionately on equity groups in higher education
and on disadvantaged schools.
The Greens, the National Tertiary Education Union and NATSEM
(the National Centre for Social and Economic Modelling at the University
of Canberra) all published models and calculators of likely fees and debts
for higher education courses within a month of the budget announcements.
NATSEM’s modelling used a range of different fee scenarios and showed that
in spite of the likelihood of large fee increases and longer repayment times
the payoff from university degrees should be expected to remain higher than
the costs—an individual dividend in lifetime earnings of around $1.5 million.
But this lifetime advantage could not be expected to accrue to all, particularly
for those with degrees with lower income profiles, such as teaching and
nursing (mostly females), and for parents (mostly females) who reduce their
employment while looking after children (Phillips 2014).
Excellence and equity
Remembering Pyne’s stark challenge ‘either we spread access to higher
education to more Australians and keep our country competitive with others
in our region, or we support a higher education system that is unsustainable,
that will decline into mediocrity, and eventually be left behind,’ one of the most
significant issues emerging from this period of attempted education reform is
the interpretation that attaches to a system characterised by excellence and
equity, differentiation of the student experience and institutional autonomy.
Abbott and Pyne’s deference to Menzies in this context is instructive,
and may suggest that during this period critical aspects of the proposed

reforms were obfuscated. Whilst Menzies did have oversight of a significantly
expanded higher education sector it is misleading to assume that this was a
relevant point of reference for the current expansion under universal higher
education. During the Menzies era the sector expanded from a tiny base—
14 000 or 0.2 percent of the population in 1939. This phase of growth was
based on post-war participation of ex-servicemen and participation of a greater
number of students of the highest academic calibre through the introduction
of the Commonwealth Scholarship Scheme in 1951.
The rhetoric drawn from Menzies regarding institutional autonomy,
academic freedom including the freedom to speak ‘truth to power’, the role of
universities to produce excellent graduates, leaders and future professionals is
language that sits comfortably, not just with Australia’s most elite educational
institutions, but with the values and aspirations of the sector as it is currently
constructed. It is dependent on mature organisations that have the trust of
their communities to deliver not just highly skilled graduates and economically
appropriate outcomes, but socially and culturally critical outcomes, particularly
in outer-metropolitan, rural and remote areas. Universities as we know them are
characterised by greater longevity and stability than many other organisations,
and historically also by a level of employment security that underpinned both
‘academic freedom’ and critical external relationship building. But the reform
agendaasproposedwouldseeamuchwiderrangeofinstitutionsandorganisations
offering higher education qualifications at much lower costs, driven by the profit
motiveandreturnstoshareholdersand,iftheexperienceintherecentlyreformed
VET sector is indicative, with far less stability and questionable quality, both of
which impact on value to students. The imperative to lower costs goes hand in
hand with high levels of casual labour and employment insecurity and decreased
capacity to engage with communities.
It should not be forgotten that the response to growth in the higher
education sector in the 1960s was the establishment of colleges of advanced
education (CAEs) as a ‘second tier’ of higher education, in large part to save
money as there was no expectation that CAEs would conduct research.

This two-tier system, which Abbott and Pyne only implicitly reference, was
created by the Menzies government on the advice of the Committee on the
Future of Tertiary Education in Australia9
. There is sufficient evidence to
suggest that the Abbott-Pyne vision for Australian higher education system
was to develop, not a public two tiered system but a differentiated system
characterised by free market competition and significant growth through a
range of private providers. This would have been an ideologically attractive
option and would have helped address the fiscal challenges posed by growth in
the sector. It would have also potentially enabled government resources to be
increasingly concentrated in research intensive universities, enabling some to
be ‘amongst the best in the world’ but with a constriction of opportunities for
the less privileged and a shift of resources to the more privileged.
Anumberofcommentatorssuggestedthatincreasedstructuralinequality
was a likely scenario. Simon Marginson, Professor of International Higher
Education at University College London noted that if the Senate passed
the package in the budget, the Abbott government would have destroyed
the predominantly public settings of the present system (Marginson 2014).
Gavin Moodie argued that ‘The result will not be the two-tiered system of
institutions that students are protesting against, and still less the different
categories of institutions that some still seek, but a more explicit, ordered and
steeper hierarchy of institutions by fees and hence funding, research, status and
elitism’ (Moodie 2014). In a similar vein, Professor Stephen Parker, then Vice
Chancellor of the University of Canberra, became the only vice chancellor
to consistently and publicly decry the proposed reforms as he deemed them
‘unfair to students and poorly designed policy. If they go through, Australia is
sleepwalking towards the privatisation of its universities’ (Parker 2014).
Despiteamendmentstotheproposedlegislationinthefaceofheatedpublic
debateAbbottandPynefracturedtherequiredsupportoftheSenateandthisled
to the ultimate failure of the Higher Education and Reform Amendment Bill
in December 2014. Pyne made a last minute attempt to split the Reform Bill10
but the bill was voted down a second time in March 2015. Despite this, Pyne

remained committed to the bill and was reported as saying ‘We will therefore
bring back the higher education reform package for the Parliament to consider.
We will not give up. This reform is too important’ (Clarke 2015).
Conclusion
Perhaps there was an overarching imperative for the Coalition government
that was not going to be served by the existing evidence-base and the
success of a significantly expanded and more equitable education system
that had been overseen by the previous government. The failure to pass the
reforms has, however, provided much needed breathing space to ensure that
Australia does not sleepwalk into a tiered, privatised system, at least without
being cognisant of the consequences and the public being more aware of the
benefits and risks.
For the public any proposed changes to university funding on the part of
the Coalition are now seen through the lens of Pyne’s failed reforms. The new
Minister,SimonBirmingham,instigateda‘reviewofreviews’from1998to2014
and announced in October 2015 that ‘higher education funding arrangements
for 2016 will not be changed from currently legislated arrangements’ (Keaney
2016). It is not clear that he has abandoned the proposed deregulation of
undergraduate university fees and there is now a heightened interest in the
accumulating costs of unpaid student debt. A consultation paper Driving
Innovation, Fairness and Excellence in Australian Higher Education, that sets out
options for reform has been made available for public comment.
The consultation paper poses many of the questions that arose during
the two years of policy debate of the Pyne reforms. It is hard to say, however,
that the government has gone back to the policy drawing board, and the
available evidence base. The paper remains silent on the issue of whether a
differentiated system of higher education is in fact intended to generate a
new hierarchy of institutions with unchartered consequences for students
and for those universities that have historically served and supported
academically less well-prepared students. While employing the rhetoric of
innovation and the knowledge economy the paper continues to focus on

the private benefits of higher education and presents the costs associated
with growth without commensurate estimates of the return to the economy
and the relevant multipliers and spillover benefits associated with increased
investment in the higher education system including fiscal externalities such
as graduate tax revenue (Cadence Economics 2016). While presenting a
strong case for equity and access, it shifts the debate to the mounting HECS
debt and repayment thresholds, again potentially having the most impact on
low income graduates and women, reinforcing ‘unintended consequences’.
In schooling, commonwealth funding is a powerful change agent
that appears to have overcome the issue of state/territory versus federal
responsibilities. The process is one that echoes striking similarities to
the rhetoric around higher education reform, where institutions have the
‘freedom’ to raise fees in the proposed deregulated environment, shifting the
costs to the students. Will school reform, especially in small jurisdictions,
also shift the costs of quality provision to the parents and community?
An agenda that seeks to improve educational outcomes, student success
and sees increased resources available to educational institutions, albeit
not sourced through government, may gain support in Australia, given the
community’salreadysignificantinvestmentinprivateschooling.Accompanying
micro-economic reform in state funding and reform in governance may well
be inevitable. But, just as in higher education, the importation of American
models from a system not known for its equity, and premised on significant
wealth, into the Australian context has the potential to generate profound
unintended consequences especially for equity and graduate debt.
Australia is conducting an unprecedented experiment in educational
reform. We seem to be doing this by flying imported kites and then looking
to see what falls in place on the ground. The formal use of green and white
papers early in the policy process, as consultation documents proposing
propositions for discussion and importantly identifying risks, are processes
that one expects to accompany major change agendas, but were not part
of the process of educational reform under the Abbott government. The
Turnbull government is now living with the consequences.

The prospects for Australia’s evolving education systems and the options
presented to date generate significant moral questions around individual
and organisational versus societal good and equality as an explicit value
that has up until now underpinned Australia’s post-war national educational
aspirations.
Endnotes
1 For details of the Demand Driven System see http://www.aph.gov.au/About_
Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/pubs/
BriefingBook44p/HigherEducation
2 Minister Pyne reminded his audience, many of whom keenly anticipated the
articulation of new policy directions, that Menzies had overseen the expansion
of the higher education system from ‘six universities and 14 236 students in
1939 to 16 universities and 91 272 students by 1966’ (Pyne 2014b).
3 In schooling policy the Independent Public Schools initiative is part of the
commonwealth’s ‘Students First’ package (http://studentsfirst.gov.au) (May
2014) that focuses on ‘teacher quality’, ‘school autonomy’, ‘engaging parents
in education’ and ‘strengthening the curriculum’. This is uncannily similar to
the US StudentsFirst lobby (http://studentsfirst.org) that aims to ‘elevate
teaching’, ‘empower parents’, and ‘govern well’, and incidentally supports the
Student Success Act that sees teacher tenure coupled to evaluation.
4 It is noteworthy that Australia’s ‘deregulation’ of higher education has also been
read as deregulation of quality assurance in some critical overseas jurisdictions,
in particular China, as evidenced at the Sino-Australia Forum on Transnational
Education and Student Mobility, Beijing, March 2015.
5 Universities Australia was established on 22 May 2007 as the peak body
representing the university sector and replaced the Australian Vice-
Chancellors’ Committee (AVCC).
6 UniversitiesAustralia(2014)AnOpenLettertoSenatorsfromUniversities
Australia,24November,https://www.universitiesaustralia.edu.au/news/media-
releases/An-open-letter-to-Senators-from-Universities-Australia#.V1UP0cdBnbB.
7 Glover, B. ‘Address to the National Press Club, 9 March 2015, https://npc.org.
au/speakers/professor-barney-glover-2/

Education policy: from bipartisan promises to radical agendas239
8 Markwell was well aware of the huge gap between the resources available to the
world’s best noting the Productivity Commission observation that ‘Harvard
University’s assets alone…are larger than the combined assets of Australia’s 37
publicly funded universities’ http://www2.trinity.unimelb.edu.au/publications/
docs/RotaryClubofMelbourne060903.pdf.
9 This committee was established in 1961 as a committee of the Australian
Universities Commission and chaired by L. H. Martin, http://hdl.voced.edu.
au/10707/228215.
10 In March 2015 Minister Pyne split his reform bill in a desperate bid to gain
Senate support. The split essentially separated the proposed 20 percent
funding cut in the Commonwealth Grants Scheme and the proposed
deregulation of fees and providers. He also guaranteed an additional twelve
months funding for the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure
Fund (NCRIS).
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