Universities Accord (Opening the Doors of Opportunity) Bill 2026

Ms COKER (Corangamite) (13:04): Education is one of the great equalising forces in our society. It can be life's biggest game changer, the catalyst that changes the course of a person's life. It can open up opportunities that once seemed out of reach.

It can give a young person the skills, confidence and qualifications to build a career, support their family and contribute to community. It can be the key to a new career when returning to work after starting a family. But, for this to be true, access to education cannot depend on your postcode, your parents' income or whether you happen to grow up in a major city.

Access to quality higher education must instead be available to all, and that is the principle at the heart of this bill, the Universities Accord (Opening the Doors of Opportunity) Bill 2026. In simple terms, it's about backing in the young person who has the marks and ambition to go to university but wonders whether they can afford it. It is about the student from a regional community who has always dreamed of becoming a teacher, a nurse, an engineer or a lawyer but worries about having to move away from home; it is about the first person in a family, just like the member for Bonner, who just spoke, to go to university navigating a system that their parents may never have experienced themselves; and it is about making sure that, when those students get through the university door, they have the support to stay at university and finish their degree.

That is why this bill is so important. This bill builds a stronger, fairer system by creating a new managed-growth funding system for Commonwealth supported places. In practice, this means the government will set the total number of funded places and the Australian Tertiary Education Commission will allocate those places between universities, with additional places directed to areas of greatest need and demand.

That means universities have greater certainty about their funded places while more opportunities can be directed to students from disadvantaged and regional backgrounds. This is important because our nation already has more Australians studying at university than ever before, and that number is going to continue to grow. The Albanese government is backing in that growth.

Next year, there will be an additional 16,000 funded Commonwealth supported places. There will be another 16,000 the year after that and another 16,000 the year after that. By 2030, there will be 19,000 additional fully-funded Commonwealth supported places.

Across the next decade, the government expects to fund an additional 230,000 commencing students at university. That is a significant investment in the future of Australians, and the important point is this is not growth for growth's sake. The system is designed to make sure those opportunities reach Australians who have historically been less likely to access university—students like those in my electorate of Corangamite, a regional electorate.

The Australian Tertiary Education Commission will have responsibility for allocating Commonwealth supported places to universities and other eligible providers. Each university's allocation will include a core student load, providing stability, as well as an additional growth allocation. That additional growth allocation is where this reform can make a real difference.

It gives the ATEC the ability to direct additional places to areas where they are most needed, including students from low socioeconomic backgrounds and students from regional and rural communities. That matters enormously. If ATEC determines that the total allocation pool is not sufficient to meet demand from students from disadvantaged backgrounds or regional and rural areas, it can ask the minister to increase that pool.

In other words, we're building a system that can grow where the need is greatest. That is a very different approach to that of the former, coalition government, which did little to ensure equitable access to higher education. The second major reform in this bill is needs based funding for universities.

There is a very clear reason for this. We know that students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds and students from regional or rural communities are less likely to commence a university degree. We also know they are less likely to complete one.

The data shows that these students can be twice as likely to leave university after their first year. This is not because they are less capable; it is because the barriers they face can be greater. The bill provides additional funding for things like tutoring, mentoring and academic support, as well as direct financial assistance through scholarships and emergency grants.

Importantly, this funding will be demand driven. It will target need. That is a significant change.

Under previous arrangements, programs such as the Higher Education Participation and Partnerships Program provided important support, but funding was capped. It should be noted that the more eligible students a university has, the more funding it will receive. Put simply, this means there is greater emphasis on attracting and keeping students who come from regional and remote areas.

The more students there are at a regional campus, the more funding the university receives. The bill sets a base equity amount of $1,535 per eligible student and a base regional amount of $1,398 per regional student, with both amounts indexed each year. Under the previous HEPPP arrangements, the average amount provided last year to universities per student was around $600.

Under this new needs based funding system it will be more than double. This means universities can use funding in a timely way that responds to the immediate needs of its students, so they are supported. That is a substantial and meaningful investment.

But what matters most is that that investment makes many things possible. It is especially important for regional universities and campuses. In my electorate of Corangamite, Deakin University is a major part of our community.

Deakin plays an important role in opening the doors of higher education to students who may otherwise have found university much harder to access. Deakin provides opportunities for students to study close to home. It contributes significantly to the local economy.

It supports local employers with highly skilled graduates. It conducts research that benefits our community and the broader region. And, importantly, it creates pathways for students from a wide range of backgrounds.

I work with Deakin and engage regularly with students, because I see the difference the right support can make. For a student, having access to university is important, particularly one close to home. Just as important is knowing there is somewhere and someone to turn to when things get difficult.

We need universities to be places where students can succeed, not simply places where students can enrol. That is why the needs based funding component of this bill is so important. It recognises that universities that are serving communities that have greater need require the resources to respond to that need.

This is the same basic principle that underpins needs based school funding. If we accept that schools should receive additional resources because of the circumstances of the students they educate, it makes sense to apply that same principle when thinking about higher education. This bill does exactly that.

The bill is also about preparing Australia for the future. The Universities Accord provides a long-term vision for our higher education system. By 2050 Australia will need a workforce in which about 80 per cent of people have a TAFE qualification or a university degree.

This is a huge challenge, but it is also a huge opportunity. We must ensure that Australians from every part of our nation can participate and contribute to a changing workforce. That means expanding access to tertiary education.

It means better harmonising VET, vocational education, and higher education. It means working closely with our universities. And it means backing in free TAFE.

It also means ensuring that regional communities aren't left behind. So investing in higher education is not simply an investment in individual students. It is an investment in the strength and resilience of our communities.

This bill also gives the Australian Tertiary Education Commission the tools to manage the growth of the system. This matters, because we need a higher education system that is coordinated, nimble and sustainable. We need universities to have certainty about their funding.

We need students to have access to places. And we need public investment to be directed where it can deliver the greatest benefit. The bill also provides transitional arrangements for universities as the new system comes into effect.

This is important. Reforms of this scale need to be implemented carefully, with universities given the stability they need to plan for the future. There is a reason education features so prominently in the story of Labor governments.

We understand that education can change the trajectory of a person's life. As a former teacher I've seen that many times. Education is the key, and I believe in it.

We understand that a child who has the opportunity to learn can become an adult who has choices, and we understand that when we invest in people we strengthen our nation. For my electorate, these reforms are real and practical. They mean more opportunities for young people who want to study.

When I speak with many young people in my electorate I hear a consistent message. They do not expect everything to be handed to them. They want to work hard.

They want to build a career. They want to contribute. The way we can deliver this is by removing the barriers and implementing reform that creates a fairer, more supportive and more accessible higher education system.

This bill is an investment in students, it's an investment in our universities, it's an investment in regional Australia and ultimately it's an investment in Australia's future. Talent is everywhere. Our job is to make sure opportunity is, too.

I commend the bill to the House.