Adelaide Student Politics

The following is in response to Mark's post.

Students have every reason to celebrate the budget
By Paris Dean

I write in response to Mark Joyce's diatribe against student's organized participation in the democratic process, and attack on the reforms they managed to achieve to Australia's system of student income support.

I was present at the last meeting of the AUU Board, where the National President of NUS, David Barrow was observing. Far from interrupting to boast about “future changes to the student income support system” as Joyce implies, Joyce himself noted Barrow's presence and called on him to speak.

Barrow spoke about the changes to the Youth Allowance system; a serious of bold and significant changes to a system that was crippled by years of neglect by the former Howard government. The system had been systematically undermined by a failure to index key eligibility criteria and a failure to address the explosion in middle and upper class rorting that had left the system hemorrhaging money to virtually everyone except the needy.

Under the Howard government the parental income test which is supposed to test whether a student's parents can support them was not indexed for inflation. As a result, more and more students in need fell off support or where denied support whose parents real wages hadn't grown a cent. This continued throughout the term of the Howard government.

At the same time the scheme was subject to an explosion in rorting of a type that had never been envisaged in the construction of the scheme. An expense and misdirection of funds tolerated by the Howard government. The workplace eligibility criteria became legendary for affording an “easy in” for students, still entirely supported by their wealthy parents, to dip into a welfare scheme for pocket money. This criteria, which became the largest growth area in new applicants, actually favored the wealthy, with many students never doing bona fide work and simply claimed as employees in parents companies. Even where students did take a gap year to work, studies showed that the taking of a gap year was more likely where students had wealthier parents. This cost blow out is reflected in this graph, which shows the average parental incomes for those students living at home and partly therefore judged by centerlink to be quite capable of living with their parents.


When it comes to measures that actually address of those in need Joyce dismissed them out of hand. Joyce scoffs at the $4,000 relocation payment and the subsequent $1,000 payments to rural students – though in all my discussions with rural students one of the greatest barriers they described was the cost of moving from the family home; he mocks the startup scholarships – though every student knows that one of the biggest academic hurdles is the prohibitive cost of textbooks and study materials.

Joyce even goes so far as to call the almost 25% increase in the parental income test - a long overdue recognition of the lack of indexing by the government he then supported - “modest”. This simple act however, will see tens of thousands of students from low income families afforded support to study.

Another critical feature dismissed is the increase in the income a student can earn before their payment is effected. The increase - which almost doubles the allowable income – again merely redresses the Howard government's neglect. Joyce bemoans the fact that students can earn “only $118” a week at present; miserable as the sum is it was his government that left it virtually unchanged for a decade, and that has been so swiftly changed by the new government

For students on Youth Allowance this budget is a huge relief. Extra support through the education scholarships, and relocation support where relevant, as well as the increased rates of allowable income will drastically improve the quality of life for students across the country. For many students in need of income support who were not eligible as a result of Howard era neglect, the changes mean the first real chance at higher education. Joyce like many Liberals does not fully appreciate the critical role that the income support system the Labor party has tended for years plays in the lives of students from low income backgrounds.

An education revolution undertaken in the midst of a global recession brought on by the neo-liberal world order inherited by this government is not easy. Hard decisions have been made – the changes to Youth Allowance are perhaps a perfect example of this. At heart however, most voters understand that the key to a sustainable income support system is fair but focused eligibility criteria.

Paris Dean
Secretary
Adelaide University Labor Club