Adelaide, UniSA merger would create an institution with clout

The union of University of Adelaide and University of South Australia would give the state a competitive world-class university.

UniSA Chancellor Jim McDowell, UniSA Vice-Chancellor David Lloyd, Adelaide University Vice-Chancellor Peter Rathjen and Adelaide University Chancellor Kevin Scarce.

The merger of the University of Adelaide and the University of South Australia is not just about the future of academic education in South Australia but also about the future economic wellbeing of the state.

Everyone debates the need for the South Australian economy to be transformed into a new world of advanced manufacturing producing high-quality, value-added primary products and service industries in tourism and education.

To meet these challenges, existing institutions have to change. Merging these two universities is one of the needed structural reforms for the state.

Some have argued that having three universities in South Australia creates competition, which is healthy. Competition can be good, but the real competition is with larger universities in the eastern states and overseas, not between our universities.

The combined turnover of South Australia’s two merging universities is about $1.6 billion. Several eastern state universities such as Melbourne and Sydney have turnovers of more than our universities combined. They are the real competition to attract students, research, money and the best staff.

In recent years UniSA research funding has been growing steadily so it does not bring a dead weight to the ranking scores of the merged university. (In the past decade its research income has grown from less than a third to half of that of Adelaide University.)

Although there may be short-term pain with a few jobs disappearing at the new university, many more quality jobs will be created in the mid to long term.

A merger would increase financial, academic and human resources to help move the university up the world rankings to challenge for a top 100 ranking.

In recent years, cases have emerged where both universities have created unnecessary expenditure when a merged university would have provided a better outcome for less money.

Both universities have built new multi-story medical centres next to each other at the west end of North Terrace. A bigger, better medical centre could have been established in one larger building at less per unit cost.

Several years ago, when it was planned to shift the Adelaide University dental school to the new west end medical centre, the university negotiated with the state government for the provision of public dentistry services.

Adelaide University could not reach agreement with the state government, resulting in the service going to tender.

Adelaide University and UniSA then fought each other to win it, resulting in Adelaide University offering millions of dollars to ensure that its dental school, with more than 100 years of world-class standing, was awarded the tender. The only winner of this unnecessary competition was the state government.

If we look at the example of the Adelaide University and UniSA law schools producing the same qualified law graduates, we have to question why two separate schools are needed.

By merging the two law schools, there would be the opportunity to provide a wider range of legal qualifications, including more specialised courses such as patent and intellectual property law. This could lead to the establishment of a speciality court dealing with patent and intellectual property law and therefore a new legal service industry in South Australia.

Recently there has been much excitement about developing the space industry in South Australia. A merged university would provide bigger support to the many start-up space-related companies in the state.

In the past three decades Adelaide and South Australia have been severely affected by declines in traditional manufacturing, resulting in job losses and creating a deep feeling of insecurity among South Australians.

A successful merger of our two biggest universities will show Australia that we have a different future based on intellect, creativity and high-quality products and services.

The biggest advantage of the merger will be a university big enough financially and resource-wise to compete against other universities across Australia and overseas with a range of benefits to South Australia.

The merged university would attract more research money, both private and public; more top academics and researchers; and a range of intellectually based companies’ dependent on research connections to the university calling Adelaide home.

More interstate and international students would be attracted, leading to increased student accommodation in the central business district and inner suburbs, creating demand for a range of services including food and entertainment. A merged university will cement Adelaide as an international university city with a world-famous university precinct stretching from the wine centre at Hackney Road to Port Road, Thebarton.

South Australia should look forward to the creation of a merged university, maybe to be called University of Adelaide, South Australia. This keeps both names and clearly identifies Adelaide, South Australia and Australia with a competitive world-class university.

Chris Schacht is a former member of the University of Adelaide council and a former Labor senator for South Australia.