Universities Accord (Opening the Doors of Opportunity) Bill 2026

Ms THWAITES (Jagajaga) (15:50): At its heart, this bill, the Universities Accord (Opening the Doors of Opportunity) Bill 2026, is about opportunity. It's about making sure that, wherever you grow up, whatever your parents earn or whatever your postcode is, is not determining what you can achieve. We on this side know that education changes lives.

It opens doors and creates opportunities not only for individuals but for families, communities and our country. We also know that talented people who want to work hard and get ahead exist everywhere in this country. But, unfortunately, opportunity doesn't always exist everywhere, and that is what we are changing with this bill.

This bill is about ensuring more Australians have the chance to study, to develop new skills and to build the careers they dream of while helping Australia to prepare for the future. We're very aware that the jobs our children and our grandchildren will have in the future won't look the same as the jobs that many of us graduated from university or training into.

Technology is transforming workplaces. Artificial intelligence is changing the way we work. The transition to clean energy is creating entirely new industries in our country.

Medical science continues to make extraordinary breakthroughs. Our population is ageing, creating a greater demand for nurses, doctors, allied health professionals, teachers, social workers and carers. I do believe that these changes bring enormous opportunity, but they also require us to think differently about education.

The Australian Universities Accord that our government set up recognised that challenge that is in front of us. It's provided us with a blueprint for Australia's higher education system over the coming decades. It tells us that, by 2050, around 80 per cent of Australians will need a university degree, diploma or certificate to meet the demands of our future workforce.

So this isn't simply an education challenge. It's an economic challenge that our country faces. It's a productivity challenge.

It is a nation-building challenge. We are clear that Australia's greatest resource is not just what lies beneath our feet. It is in fact our people.

It is their ideas, their skills, their creativity and their potential. So we must make sure we unlock that potential. If we want Australia to remain prosperous, competitive and resilient, we need to continue our investment in people, and that is exactly what this bill does.

Our government asked the Australian Universities Accord to consider a range of issues, including the former coalition's job-ready graduates scheme. We've now implemented every recommendation of the accord's interim report, and we've started the work of implementing recommendations from the final report. Over the last two years, we've implemented 31 of the 47 recommendations in full or in part.

As the Minister for Education has said, there's more work to do. He has said that the scheme is unfinished business. I hear from people in my community who remain concerned about the job-ready graduates scheme.

The government is and will keep working through the recommendations in the final report and will take advice from ATEC as well. We have a good track record in this space. The Albanese government has made HECS fairer by cutting student debt by 20 per cent.

We've fixed unfair education and raised the repayment threshold so that graduates keep more of what they earn. We've introduced an expanded paid prac for teaching, nursing, midwifery and social work students. We've expanded university study hubs across regional and suburban Australia, including one near my community in Epping.

We've increased free university preparation courses. We've established the National Student Ombudsman and strengthened protections against gender based violence on campus. We've made Commonwealth-supported places demand driven for First Nations students who earn the marks to get in.

We've established the Australian Tertiary Education Commission and we've made free TAFE permanent, which is already making a real difference for students at our local Greensborough and Heidelberg West polytechnic campuses. The reforms we're delivering through this work build on that, creating a new funding system that helps universities grow while making sure more Australians have the opportunity to study and to succeed.

Australia needs more graduates, and universities need certainty to plan for that growth. Students also deserve and need to know that there will be opportunities available to them. The new managed-growth funding system will help to make sure that that happens.

It will allow the Commonwealth to better plan where university places are needed and to support universities to grow in a sustainable way. This bill also introduced demand-driven, needs based funding. This is one of the components of this legislation that will make the biggest difference, because, of course, getting into university is only part of the journey.

We know that students also need the support to finish, and there have been too many cases where capable young Australians begin university only to, while they're there, find themselves struggling financially while they're juggling work commitments, caring responsibilities or perhaps simply feeling like they don't belong or they're not doing well enough. This bill recognises that struggle.

Universities that educate more students from low-socioeconomic backgrounds, from First Nations communities and from regional campuses will receive additional funding to support those students. That funding can be used for tutoring, mentoring, academic support, scholarships, emergency financial assistance and wellbeing services. That is going to change the experience for those students who need it most.

It is going to make sure that, as well as getting a pathway into university and higher education, they have the opportunity not just to stay there but to thrive while they are there. Under this new, needs based funding system, the amount of funding per student will more than double next year in some cases. Like our Gonski funding for schools, the more students a university has that meet the criteria, the more funding they will receive to help those students to participate and to succeed at university.

That's what fairness looks like. That's what helping Australians to get ahead looks like. It is what Labor governments have always believed in and how we deliver not just for Australians today but for the future of those to come and for our country as we build for the future.

One thing the Liberals, Nationals and One Nation have shown us time and time again is that they are unwilling to support fairness and opportunity for Australians who do want to get the skills and qualifications to get ahead. They opposed free TAFE. They opposed cutting student debt by 20 per cent.

They opposed making student loan repayments fairer. Every time this government acts to open the doors of opportunity to more Australians, those opposite find a reason to vote no. Just recently we saw another example of how they see Australians who deserve more support to get ahead.

We saw that through Senator Bragg saying that Australians on lower incomes should simply accept lower quality housing. It tells you everything about the priorities of those opposite. Whether it's cutting free TAFE, our efforts to cut student debt, cheaper child care, strengthening paid parental leave or expanding Medicare, the choice is clear.

Labor believes government should help people get ahead no matter where they come from or how much they earn. Those opposite have shown time and again that, when we act to give Australians a fair go, they will stand in our way. In Jagajaga we're fortunate to have a fantastic local university, La Trobe University, which supports our community.

For generations La Trobe has opened doors for students from Melbourne's north-east and from well beyond. It supports graduates who go on to strengthen not just our community but also those right across the nation. I know that La Trobe has for a very long time had a reputation of supporting students who do come from diverse backgrounds, who do come from a diverse range of socioeconomic backgrounds.

We're seeing incredible work happening through the biomedical precinct, where research, education and health care are coming together to improve lives. We see exciting investment in emerging technologies, including quantum research, at La Trobe, helping to prepare Australia for the industries of tomorrow. I'm confident that the students studying there today will become tomorrow's innovators and our teachers, engineers, psychologists, researchers, climate scientists and business leaders.

I'm pleased that many of them come from suburbs across Jagajaga, from Heidelberg West, Bellfield, Macleod, Watsonia, Greensborough, Montmorency and Eltham. Some of them are the first in their family to attend university, and we want that to continue to be the case. We want to see that build.

We know that, at the moment, a young person from a low-income family is still far less likely to attend university than someone from a wealthier background. We know that students from regional Australia continue to face additional barriers. We know that many First Nations students face challenges that others simply don't.

None of that reflects a lack of ability; it reflects unequal opportunity. This bill is our government assuring Australians that we can and will do better. These reforms are expected to support around 230,000 additional commencing domestic university students over the next decade.

That's 230,000 more Australians with the opportunity to build a career they love, to contribute to our economy and to build a stronger society for all of us. That's the future teachers, nurses, engineers, researchers, scientists and innovators. That's the people who'll be in jobs that we can't even dream of at the moment.

But doing this work now, setting our country up so that all Australians get the opportunity, is what being future ready looks like. It's not just about preparing people for their first job; it's about preparing Australians for the careers that will evolve over decades and giving people the skills to adapt, to continue learning and to embrace change throughout their lives, no matter what their background is.

I have this conversation regularly in my community. People look to government and say: 'Are you going to build us a stronger community going forward? In a time that feels uncertain, what are you doing to make sure that the Australian promise will continue to be there and that there is opportunity for all?' I assure those people in my community and around the country that that's what this government continues to be focused on—making sure that all Australians get that opportunity to get ahead, to get an education and, with our further reforms, to get a foot into the housing market.

So I'm so pleased that we are delivering this work through this bill and through the universities accord, building a tertiary education system that's connected, flexible and focused on the future. Labor has always believed that education is one of the greatest investments any government can make. Our track record is clear, and we are not resting on our laurels.

We know that every generation benefits because previous generations invest in education, so our responsibility is to leave the next generation with more opportunities that we inherited. This bill backs aspiration. It prepares Australia for the future, no matter what that future may be.

I am disappointed, as ever, that those opposite lack that ambition for Australians and lack that ambition for students now and into the future, and that they are not backing more opportunities but instead standing in the way of this progress. Wherever you grow up and whatever your circumstances are, if you have the talent and the determination to succeed, Australia should back you.

That is what this government is doing with this bill. I commend the bill to the House. Debate adjourned.