"There
Are Two Really Big Issues for Universities Now: Indexation and Research."
-- Denise Bradley, V-C USA (May 11,
2005)
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News & Views item - May 2005 |
"There
Are Two Really Big Issues for Universities Now: Indexation and Research."
-- Denise Bradley, V-C USA (May 11,
2005)
The Vice-Chancellor of the University of South Australia, Professor Denise Bradley told The Australian's she had set her hopes deliberately low for this year's federal budget as a safeguard against disappointment.
She was right to do so.
The Minister for Education, Science and Training, Brendan Nelson, had already informed the universities that they were so well cashed up they didn't need and wouldn't get any readjustment of the current indexation formula for Commonwealth block grants. Their argument that the wage adjustment used under the existing system falls below the real increases in salaries at universities, and is costing them up to $568million a year was directed to a cloth ear. And the 2005-06 budget of Treasurer Peter Costello brought no additional funding for research. Hardly surprising -- the Prime Minister, John Howard, had previously let it be known that as far as his government was concerned Backing Australia's Ability II was it -- with the implication "and you ought to be bloody grateful you're getting that" as though dealing with a recalcitrant child reluctantly being given his allowance.
Professor Bradley went on to tell The Australian "We are constantly chasing our tails ... we aren't allowed to increase our prices but costs keep going up. If we can't increase revenue from government -- and I really don't think there is much more cost cutting we can do -- then there is one other source of supply [the students], and I don't like it. As a person with a commitment to public education, I am left quite concerned at the extent to which we are now moving in Australia to very high levels of private responsibility for the cost of university education."
And she indicated that she hadn't really expected any alteration in research funding while the Research Quality Framework as underdevelopment.
Frankly, the is little likelihood that the RQF will introduce a significant rise in research funding. A redistribution of current funding is more than likely, but funding to redress the serious problems with regard to research infrastructure and staffing in the sciences, it's not going to happen.
