Higher Education Support Amendment

(Response to the Australian Universities Accord Interim Report) Bill 2023 - Second Reading

There's something really powerful about being the first whatever it is. But, when people are the first in their family to go to university, that sends a message through the generations to open those doors of opportunity a little bit wider.

Recently I spoke at the NAIDOC Ball in Western Australia, and I shared the story of Irwin Lewis who, way back in 1957, walked onto the campus of the University of Western Australia for the very first time.

Most students, when they walk onto campus, are nervous. They are worried about whether they're in the right place, whether they're there for the right reasons and how they're going to go.

Maybe they're worried about if they're going to make any friends and all the rest. But I reckon it's possible that Irwin Lewis would have been one of the most nervous students walking onto that campus that year, 1957. He was the first Aboriginal student to attend university in Western Australia.

He was attending university just three years after what was then called the 'native pass' system, which would have prevented him from being able to visit that very institution in Perth.

From his home in Morawa, he went on to be dux at Christ Church Grammar School and he studied at the University of Western Australia. He helped win a WA Football League premiership with Claremont in 1964, and he went on to a great career as a leading public servant in Western Australia.

Indeed, the SBS obituary for Irwin Lewis said he was a 'Western Australian Aboriginal footy legend', and in many ways his story itself is legendary—that these institutions that had kept their doors closed for so long to too many finally opened them up and that the university itself was all the richer.

What I didn't know when speaking at the NAIDOC Ball was that, at an event of 1,100 people having a great time at Crown, just over the border from my electorate, at the next table was Irwin's son Chris Lewis, who himself was a great player for the West Coast Eagles. He came up to me afterwards and said, 'Nice words about my dad—thank you.' It was a real honour to be able to share his story.

But I've continued to have people contact me about this incredible Western Australian.

Pat Pearce reached out. Pat started working at the UWA bookshop in the 1950s after moving from Collie in her 20s. She worked there for decades until she retired. She's now 94 years old and still an avid politics watcher, and she shared this.

I'll put it in her words, which I think just talk to what it means when we do our work in this place to open those doors a little bit wider.

These are Pat's words: 'I was on the UWA campus the day Irwin Lewis started at uni. The buzz was everywhere. People were talking with excitement about the news of the first Aboriginal student on campus, when they came into the uni bookshop, where I worked. Everyone expressed surprise, and they were happy that he had come so far, expecting that he would be the leader of a new beginning. People were keen to see him.' He himself, she reported, seemed unmoved by all the fuss. She then said:

… the fuss died down pretty quickly because he'd been such a success on the sporting field that the boys from—

in her words—

'those schools' accepted him as one of their cohort.

I think that in that we hear just how challenging it was but also how important it was that we opened up our institutions and universities just that little bit more to more people.

That's, again, what this amendment we move today seeks to do: make sure that more people can go to university, stay at university and have all of the opportunities that come from that.

I've talked about Irwin Lewis attending UWA in 1957, but what also happened in 1957 was that my dad was born. He attended Claremont Teachers College in the 1970s and spent decades as a teacher.

Just last month, my dad, Ron Gorman, finished up after 24 years at the Association of Independent Schools of Western Australia, where he had worked for decades making sure that we give more opportunity to more young Western Australians to fulfil their dreams.

What really touched me about dad's farewell at Clancy's at Fremantle, where he was joined by people who had worked with him across his entire professional career, from teachers, academics and all the rest, was that dad singled out the fact that universities were opened in the 1970s to kids like him.

Dad was the son of a single mum who lived in public housing. If it hadn't been for the decision of the Whitlam government to make our universities more accessible, his life would have been completely different.

He felt that even after all that time, all that professional success, he needed to highlight to those who were there to celebrate him that it wasn't just because of what he'd achieved; it was because of the opportunities that were built for him.

We continue, decade after decade, to make sure that more and more people can have access to those opportunities.

I have been fortunate enough to attend university myself. In February 2003 I rocked up at Curtin University as a student who didn't really know what I wanted to do with my time. 'I'll go to university, figure it out while I'm there.' I had a of job that I loved working at McDonald's. It had to compete with my question: what did I enjoy more?

What university gave me apart from a great education at Curtin University, which also produced excellent academics such as Dr Anne Aly, was I found what I was passionate about. If university is what you need, attending university helps you to find that course in life.

Going to university also gave me life-long friends, including the person who now serves as the member for Swan and David Goncalves among others. While at university I found my passion for ensuring that we do make our universities as accessible and as welcoming as possible so that everyone who wishes to can have the opportunity of getting a great world-class Australian education.

When it comes to what universities we have in Western Australia, we have terrific WA universities like Murdoch University, Curtin University and the University of Western Australia.

I have visited its Crawley campus and also some of the other campuses, including in Albany and elsewhere. We also have Notre Dame in Fremantle.

I grew up in Fremantle as Notre Dame was growing and growing. My little primary school on Henry Street was at one end of the street, and the ever-growing empire of Notre Dame was at the other end of the street.

It's a great university, and makes me think about the future of the other great University in Western Australia, that being Edith Cowan University.

I was fortunate enough to visit the newest campus of the Western Australian university network, so new that it's still being built in my electorate. I visited with the Minister for Education last week, on 29 August.

What is being built in the heart of Perth, atop the Perth City Link, is a project championed by the now Prime Minister when he was infrastructure minister. It will be a future home for some 2,000 academics and university staff and some 10,000 students at the ECU Perth campus. I was there for the ground-breaking ceremony back on 20 February this year.

What we saw then was dirt, a bunch of politicians in hard hats and some shovels. A few things have changed since then. I was there with then Premier Mark McGowan, and that has changed. But what has also changed is we already have three what they call superstoreys.

They're not just your normal storey but superstoreys beaming out of the ground for this campus that will soon be a real jewel in the crown of Western Australia, reminding everyone of both Western Australia's proud heritage as the place that elected the first woman to parliament but also somewhere that truly values both the immediate and the long-term economic and social benefits of a university education.

I want to thank all of construction workers who are helping build that dream into a reality. It is so very exciting.

But this legislation is not just about what we build. It's about making sure that, once people enter those buildings or indeed online universities or study remotely, which I have also participated in, the quality of that education is incredibly high.

As we seek to open those doors of opportunity just a little wider for more Australians to go to university, we're doing some of the priority actions from the interim report.

The minister has outlined from this dispatch box that we're creating more student study hubs not just in the regions but in the outer suburbs because this is something that's proven to work.

It's proven to make it easier for students to stay engaged in university, to give them the support they need, to provide the network to get new students in, and when you've got something that's working—particularly working in the regions—why not do more of it?

That's exactly what we're doing.

We're going to scrap what is known as the 50 per cent pass rule and instead get better reporting on how students are progressing.

Again, we know that once you've invested thousands of dollars in a university student's education, and you know that student probably can get through the course, we're better off to help them through because we've already put the investment in, rather than to just penalise them and kick them out.

We will extend the demand-driven funding that is currently provided for Indigenous students from regional and remote areas to cover all Indigenous students.

Again, it makes a huge difference in my electorate of Perth, ensuring that Indigenous students, the Irwin Lewis's of the next generation, can have access to a Commonwealth-supported place based on their capability not based on where they live. That is something that I think we can all welcome.

Of course, we have continued to commit to providing funding certainty during the accord process by extending the Higher Education Continuity Guarantee through 2024 and 2025 because we want to make sure that our universities, and their management, continue to deliver those world-class education products. Of course, we'll continue to work with the states and territories to improve university governance.

That's a little bit about what we want to see. We are conscious that what we have commissioned is the largest review of Australia's higher education system in 15 years.

We have seen our higher education system tested in many different ways over that time. We saw what happened during the pandemic. We've seen the demands for new skills. We've seen our universities, in the time since then, rapidly expand the sorts of skills they're delivering, particularly when it comes to ensuring cybersecurity, and ensuring that we have the quality teaching and research that is needed for the challenges of the century that lies before us, while maintaining the rigour and tradition that comes from our higher education sector, and that we do recognise that these are essential institutions for the Australian economy. They train so many people who take on important roles.

They also provide incredibly important, secure work for many people in my community who deserve to know that their work is both valued and appreciated, and also secure.

When we think about how to put it in really simple terms, in terms of the transition that we're going to go through, currently 36 per cent of the Australian workforce has a university qualification.

The interim report estimates that that could jump to some 55 per cent by the middle of this century. We know that we need to invest in change. We know we need to help more people engage in our higher education system.

Deputy Speaker Vasta, I'm sure you'll allow me to do this, as a friend. In the final minute of this speech, I've got to give a shout-out to one particular university student, my wife, Jess Bukowski.

Jess is currently in the last two months of her Master of Business Administration which she's studying at the University of Western Australia. Jess, the kids and I are incredibly proud of you making that decision to study. We're so excited that you are almost at the end of it.

And because I will be doing the important role of spending time here with you, Deputy Speaker, and many other colleagues, I'll also say a very happy wedding anniversary for tomorrow, which I will not be home for. Thank you.