Government whitewash of HECS rise won't work, says NTEU
25 August 1997
The Federal Government\'s attempt to whitewash its HECS policies is doomed to fail, according to the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU). Its paper on the effects of HECS increases, released last week, tries to portray the decline in applications for higher education in 1997 as part of a long-term trend.
While it is true that overall applications for university places have fallen slightly in each of the last four years, this has not been the case for the nearly fifty percent of would-be students who are aged 20 or over, the Union points out.
\"The slight decline in applications has been confined to the school-leaver cohort,\" said Jane Nicholls, NTEU National Research Officer. \"This has coincided with a slow decline in their numbers in the population and also a small annual reduction in school retention rates from their peak in 1992.
\"Nevertheless, the drop in 1997 applications from school-leavers was greater than the paper\'s own parameters would lead you to expect.
\"A disturbing phenomenon, however, is the marked drop in applications from mature-aged students,\" Ms Nicholls said. \"The DEETYA paper admits that this has amounted to around 10% in 1997, following the announcement of the HECS increases and the earlier repayment measures.
\"Older applicants tend to come from less advantaged backgrounds than school-leaver entrants to higher education. Therefore the large reduction in their interest in entering university is extremely worrying.\"
It was ridiculous for the Government to deny a link between this sudden trend and its HECS policies, she said. \"For a start, the lower HECS repayment threshold, introduced this year, means that people on low incomes and in part-time employment - including older students who are also in the paid workforce - will be obliged to commence repayment of their HECS debt immediately, while they are actually studying. Add this burden to the costs of university study itself (Textbooks, computer and so on) and many people will find themselves unable to afford the luxury of higher education.\"
Ms Nicholls said that the Government\'s discussion paper failed to analyse the patterns in applications for different courses following the introduction of the new differential HECS system. \"Trends in 1997 varied between institutions and courses, as the paper points out,\" she said. \"But, at least in the more populous States, it has been the highest-status institutions which have maintained their popularity, while the newer and less established generally suffered markedly lower application levels.
\"This is to be expected, and it provides further evidence that the new HECS provisions will hit the disadvantaged disproportionately. Those from lower socioeconomic groups have been aspiring in larger numbers to higher education, but they tend to aim for the newer, outer-metropolitan and regional institutions. It is in these very universities that interest in applying has fallen.\"
Further information Jane Nicholls, National Research Officer 03 9254 1910 (bh)