Crossbench MPs and Senators unite in ‘urgent’ push to overhaul HECS-HELP student loan system
Key crossbenchers will seize on a landmark review to push Labor to “urgently” overhaul the student loan system before more than three million Australians have their debts hiked up in June.
National
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Key crossbenchers will seize on a landmark review to push Labor to “urgently” overhaul the student loan system before more than three million Australians have their debts hiked up in June.
Senators and MPs have called for immediate action on several recommendations in the Universities Accord released by the federal government, including tying the indexation of HECS-HELP loans to whichever is lower out of inflation or wages growth, to stop students’ debts climbing faster than they can pay them off.
Education Minister Jason Clare has acknowledged the need to make the system “fairer and simpler”, saying Labor would respond to the Accord “in the next few months”.
But with debts due to be indexed by early June, multiple crossbenchers have confirmed they will pressure Labor to implement reforms much sooner.
The Accord has also recommended changing the timing of indexation of loans, and a review of bank lending practices to ensure student debts are not treated in a way that limits young peoples’ borrowing capacity for home loans.
It recommended reducing upfront costs for people on lower incomes, proposing a repayment model that would result on a graduate earning about $75,000 paying about $1000 less annually.
Wentworth MP Allegra Spender said she would be taking the fight on student financial issues to the government this week in parliament.
“The changes to loans and indexation needs to be implemented straight away,” she said.
“Cost of living pressures are being felt unequally across the country, and young people in general are feeling it worse.”
Ms Spender said indexing student loans to whatever was lower out of wage or inflation growth, and ensuring debts are not “counted twice” against young people seeking home loan approvals were critically important changes.
Independent ACT Senator David Pocock also said the government must “act now” to change how HECS-HELP loans are indexed, as well as other financial measures such as the level of student income support and reform unpaid placements.
“Together these measures will mean students don’t have to live in poverty and will open up the possibility of tertiary study to more young people,” he said.
Kooyong MP Monique Ryan said young people starting out their careers should not be straddled with student debts rising faster than their wages were.
“The system is unfair,” she said. “Young people are facing a cost-of-living crisis, a housing crisis, and the climate crisis – they should not be burdened with a HECS-HELP debt crisis as well.”
Ms Ryan said she was calling on Labor to accept the recommendations “as a matter of urgency”.
Goldstein MP Zoe Daniel also backed the recommendations, arguing HECS-HELP was “no longer fit for purpose”.
“Tertiary education is more than a cost, it is an investment in our future,” she said.
Mr Clare said Labor would now work out which of the Accord’s recommendations to implement first.
“You can’t do everything at once,” he said. “This is bigger than one budget.”
National Union of Students president Ngaire Bogemann welcomed many of the recommendations, but said students needed “action, not more government platitudes”.
“We urge the federal government to listen to the voices of students and take immediate action on the reforms,” she said.
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