National Student Ombudsman Levy Bill 2026
Mr BURNELL (Spence) (18:30): The National Student Ombudsman Levy Bill 2026 is about ensuring that students across Australia continue to have access to a free, independent and effective ombudsman for their needs. This is also about making sure that this important service has a sustainable funding model for the future. To understand why that matters, it's worth looking at the broader transformation taking place across Australia's tertiary education system.
In February 2024, the Albanese Labor government released the final report of the Australian Universities Accord. That accord provides a blueprint for reforming higher education, not simply for the next few years but for the next decade and the decade after that. The jobs our young people will enter are changing, the skills businesses require are changing and the qualifications Australians will need throughout their working lives are changing as well.
Over the coming decades, around 80 per cent of people in our workforce will need a certificate, diploma or university degree. Reaching that level will require more Australians going to TAFE. It will require more Australians going to university.
Importantly, it will require our tertiary education system to reach people and communities who have historically been underrepresented in higher education. Already, the Albanese Labor government has implemented more than 30 of the accord's 47 recommendations, either in full or in part. We have made HECS fairer by cutting student debts by 20 per cent.
Changes to indexation mean HECS debts are now indexed by the lower of the consumer price index or wage price index. We have increased the minimum repayment threshold and moved towards a marginal repayment system. Those reforms recognise that getting an education should help Australians get ahead in life, not leave them feeling as though they are falling further behind.
Alongside those changes, this government has introduced paid prac for the first time. For generations of students, compulsory placements have presented a very real financial challenge. We are changing that.
It means more students can focus on completing the practical training they need without having to choose between their qualification and paying their bills. As well as this, access to university itself has also been expanded. The government is doubling the number of university study hubs, with 20 new regional university study hubs and 14 new suburban university study hubs.
I had the pleasure of seeing what this means first-hand to my community in the north. In January, I joined the Minister for Education to open Uni Hub Playford. For communities like mine, initiatives like Uni Hub Playford matter enormously.
Not every student can simply pack their bags, move closer to a major university campus or reorganise their life around study. People have families, jobs, caring responsibilities, community commitments. Some are the first people in their family to consider university and may not have the networks or support that others may take for granted.
Bringing university support closer to where people live helps break down those barriers. It tells students in the northern suburbs that higher education is for them too. The government has also increased the number of free university bridging courses, helping more Australians build the skills and confidence necessary to begin higher education.
However, a world-class university system cannot simply be measured by the number of students who walk through the door. It must be also judged by what happens to those students once they are in sight. Students need confidence that, when something goes wrong, their concerns will be heard.
They need confidence their complaints will be taken seriously. Most importantly, there must be somewhere independent for students to turn when the internal process of their institution failed to resolve their concerns. That is why the National Student Ombudsman is so important.
For the first time, higher education students across Australia have access to a free, independent and trauma-informed service where they can escalate complaints about their provider. For too long, students who experienced serious problems could find themselves navigating the very institution they were complaining about in order to seek a resolution. Many institutions worked hard to resolve complaints appropriately, but longstanding failures in complaints handling across parts of the sector demonstrated the need for an independent pathway.
The National Student Ombudsman provides that pathway. So, when students cannot resolve an issue through their provider's internal processes, they now have somewhere else to turn. That can involve individual complaints, but the work of the ombudsman goes much further than that.
It identifies systemic issues affecting students. Through its investigations and engagement with providers, it provides guidance about best-practice complaints handling. That work helps improve governance across the sector and provides insights that institutions can use to improve their own systems.
In turn, that strengthens trust between students and their universities. The early results demonstrate just how necessary this service has been. As of 31 August 2026, the National Student Ombudsman had received 7,690 student contacts.
It had resolved 6,016 of those matters, representing 78 per cent of all contacts received since it commenced operations. Even more encouragingly, 93 per cent of complaints have been resolved through informal dispute-resolution processes. That means practical outcomes have been achieved for students while, where possible, constructive relationships between students and providers are maintained.
There is also evidence that this work is driving change beyond individual complaints. Of higher education providers surveyed by the National Student Ombudsman, 80 per cent reported that they were implementing system or service improvements following complaints-handling and education engagements. That is exactly what we should want from the ombudsman.
The objective should not simply be to resolve one complaint and move on to the next; we should learn from those complaints. Providers should be able to identify where systems have failed, understand why they have failed and make changes so that other students do not experience the same problems. The question before us, through these bills, is how we sustainably fund that work into the future.
During the establishment phase, the costs of the National Student Ombudsman have been covered by the Australian government. The government made the higher education sector aware in March 2024 of its intention to move towards recovering the ongoing costs of the ombudsman's operations. The 2026-27 budget confirmed the next stage of that process.
These bills deliver on the government's budget measure to undertake full cost-recovery of the National Student Ombudsman's operations from the higher education sector from 1 January 2027. The National Student Ombudsman Levy Bill establishes the legislative framework for a levy on higher education providers. That levy will recover the costs associated with administering the National Student Ombudsman.
It will apply to all higher education providers registered with the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency from 1 January 2027. Importantly, this levy is about cost recovery. It's not designed to become another revenue stream for government.
Operating costs will be recovered in arrears, and the levy is not intended to generate additional revenue beyond the costs of operating the National Student Ombudsman. The precise method used to calculate the amount payable will be established through regulations or guidelines, following further consultation with the higher education sector. That consultation is important because Australia's higher education sector is diverse, with no two institutions the same.
Providers vary significantly in size, structure and the number of students they serve. The framework established by this legislation allows the government to undertake that further consultation before settling the detailed calculation arrangements. Alongside the levy bill, the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency Amendment (National Student Ombudsman Levy) Bill establishes the associated collection arrangements.
Payment of the levy, along with any applicable penalty for late payment, will become a condition of registration for higher education providers. Together, these bills provide the legislative architecture required for a sustainable cost-recovery model. The government is providing $44.3 million over four years from 2026-27 to underwrite the annual operating costs of the National Student Ombudsman.
Those costs will then be recovered annually from higher education providers through the levy. Critically, students themselves will not be charged. The National Student Ombudsman will remain free for students.
That principle is fundamental to this legislation. A student experiencing a serious problem with their provider should never have to ask whether they can afford to have their complaint independently considered. Financial circumstances should not determine whether someone can seek help, nor should we establish an independent complaint system and then place a financial barrier in front of the students who need to use it.
Under this model, the sector contributes towards maintaining the independent system that supports accountability and improvement across that same sector. Providers benefit from better complaints handling, and they benefit from identifying systemic problems earlier. Universities benefit when students have greater confidence in their institutions, and the entire higher education system benefits when there are clear and independent mechanisms for accountability.
This reform should therefore be considered as part of the much broader work under way across tertiary education. The universities accord has given Australia a roadmap for where our higher education system needs to go. As we move forward as a nation, we need more Australians gaining qualifications.
That means opening the doors of universities and TAFE to people who might previously have thought those opportunities were beyond their reach. Reducing financial barriers is an important part of making higher education more accessible, and bringing study opportunities close to where people live gives more Australians the chance to pursue a qualification without having to uproot their lives.
Supporting students through compulsory placements helps ensure financial pressure does not stand between them and completing their degree. Expanding opportunities for First Nations Australians is equally important so that more students have the ability and ambition to attend university, and that they have a genuine pathway to do so. Yet increasing participation is only one half of the job.
Once we encourage more Australians into higher education, we also have a responsibility to ensure that the system works for them. Students deserve safe learning environments; they deserve institutions that respond appropriately when problems arise. When internal processes do not work, they deserve access to an independent avenue for resolving their concerns.
The National Student Ombudsman provides that avenue. In a little over a year and a half of operation, thousands of students have already reached out for assistance, thousands of matters have been resolved, and providers are changing their system as a result. That demonstrates the value of this reform and reinforces why it needs a sustainable funding base.
For those reasons, I commend this bill to the house.