Universities Accord (Opening the Doors of Opportunity) Bill 2026

Mr CLARE (Blaxland—Minister for Education) (17:15): I now move: That Senate amendments (1) to (35) and (37) to (43) be agreed to. This is an important bill, and I want to thank all members and senators for their interest in and contributions to this debate. This bill will open the doors of opportunity to our universities for more young people from poor families, from regional Australia and from the bush.

This bill switches on the two big equity engines in the universities accord. The first is the new managed-growth funding system that will provide an extra $3.6 billion and support an extra 230,000 commencing students over the next decade. The second is the demand driven, needs based funding system.

This will help more students from poor backgrounds, Indigenous students and students studying in the regions to participate in and succeed in their studies. Taken together, the impacts of these two big equity engines will be transformational for the university system but, even more importantly, for future university students— A baby having begun crying in the gallery— Mr CLARE: like one that I think we just heard a moment ago.

They'll walk through the doors that we have opened through these reforms. Talent is everywhere; it's opportunity that's not. This bill helps to do something about that.

The amendments before the chamber are a culmination of work to strengthen the bill. I want to thank my friend the shadow minister for education and also Senator Faruqi for their constructive engagement on the bill and with me and with my office. I thank the shadow minister's office as well for the collaborative and professional way in which our two teams have worked together.

We're proof that we can do it, and we have. This bill is better for the amendments that we've worked on together. I also want to thank members of the Senate Education and Employment Legislation Committee, chaired by Senator Marielle Smith, for their work to help improve the bill.

I also want to thank those from the university sector who've helped to strengthen this important legislation, including Universities Australia, the 2050 Alliance, the Regional Universities Network and the Australian Technology Network of Universities, amongst many others. When this bill was first debated here in the House of Representatives, I said that we would consider the amendments that were moved by members of the crossbench in this House once the work of the Senate committee was done.

This has now happened, and I trust that members of this place will see improvements to this bill on matters that they were keenly interested in, such as ministerial powers, improved transparency, the use of needs based funding and ministerial directions in relation to particular courses. These improvements were made in the amendments agreed to in the Senate this morning.

The universities accord is a blueprint for change to help us build something that's bigger and better and fairer than we have today and to help us build the workforce of tomorrow and the country of tomorrow. I commend the amendments and the bill to the chamber. Question agreed to.