PRIVATE MEMBERS' BUSINESS
Ms PENFOLD (Lyne) (13:12): I rise to support the expansion of the Commonwealth prac payment. I do so because this is an issue I've spoken about in the House before, an issue that was first brought home to me, not in Canberra, but by students at Charles Sturt University in Port Macquarie. The motion notes the government's additional $158.4 million investment to extend Commonwealth prac payments to 10 additional frontline health professionals from 1 July next year.
That is a welcome step because, for many students, mandatory placement isn't just a part of getting a degree, it can be the point at which they wonder whether they can afford to finish it. Several years ago I attended O-week at Charles Sturt University in Port Macquarie and spent time talking with students. The No. 1 issue again and again they raised was the same problem: mandatory professional placements.
Students told me about having to give up paid work for weeks at a time, about travelling long distances for placements, about paying for temporary accommodation while still paying rent at home, about watching the bills continue to arrive while their income disappeared. They described an impossible choice between earning a living and completing the practical training they needed to graduate.
Those conversations stayed with me. They helped shape what became Nationals policy—extending Commonwealth prac payments to allied health and veterinary students. So I welcome the government moving further in that direction.
From 1 July 2027, the payment will be extended to students in 10 additional disciplines, including clinical psychology, physiotherapy, occupational therapy, speech pathology, paramedicine, radiography, pharmacy, rehabilitation therapies, audiology and podiatry. That matters enormously in regional Australia because the financial burden of placement can be particularly acute, with regional students travelling hundreds of kilometres, often having to find temporary accommodation and giving up paid employment at the same time.
When a student cannot afford to complete a placement, that is not only a loss for that student but a loss for communities desperately trying to find those allied health professions and other health professionals. That is why Commonwealth payments are not simply student assistance; they are our regional workforce policy. While I welcome the expansion, we should also be clear the job is still not finished.
There are allied health students undertaking substantial mandatory professional placements who remain outside the scheme. Nuclear medicine students are one example. The government has chosen 10 disciplines for this expansion, but nuclear medicine is not among them.
That exposes a broader problem with drawing an arbitrary line through the allied health workforce. If we accept the principle that a student should not be financially punished because their professional qualification requires them to undertake weeks or months of mandatory unpaid placement, then that principle should be applied consistently. A nuclear medicine student loses their income while on placement, just as a radiography student does.
They can face the same petrol costs, the same accommodation bill, the same rent waiting for them at home and the same pressure to choose between keeping a job and completing their degree. The financial hardship does not change because Canberra has placed one profession on a list and left another one off. If the government is going to support students who are required to undertake mandatory professional placements, it needs to make the support comprehensive.
That means examining all allied health professionals still excluded, and, from a National Party perspective, including veterinary students who also undertake extensive placements and who are desperately needed across regional Australia. It also means looking again at the eligibility rules. I've previously spoken in the House about Emily Boxhall, from Wauchope, who was unable to access Centrelink and worked to support herself through university but fell below the work threshold required to qualify for the prac payment.
She was doing everything we ask of a young Australian—studying, working and trying to support herself—yet she was falling between the cracks. While I welcome this expansion and I acknowledge its progress, good policy should follow the principle through to its logical conclusion. If mandatory placement is essential to qualifying for a profession Australia needs, students should not be driven into financial hardship simply to complete it.
Let's include the professions still missing, let's make the eligibility rules fair and let's build a Commonwealth prac payment that is comprehensive enough to ensure that a student's choice of profession or their postcode does not determine whether they can afford to finish a degree. I look forward to attending O-Week again next year, talking to students and making sure they have what they need to get their qualifications.