Repercussions from Passage of the Voluntary Student Unionism Act. (December 12, 2005)

    The unexpected passage of the bill endorsing Voluntary Student Unionism has thrown into sharp relief the adversarial approach of the federal Coalition Government toward Australia's university sector.

It has already been pointed out by Queensland Senator Barney Joyce that the non-compulsory charging of university students' fees for extra-academic services makes Australia one of only two nations who has adopted such a policy.

"It's just us and China, we're the only ones that don't have a compulsory fee now -- interesting who we've decided to align ourselves with." And the Senator immediately followed up that observation with the assessment, "This is the redneck philistine approach of what a university's about."

In fact the clear intention of the federal government has been, and continues to be, to bring the university sector to heel, and that has been its approach since it assumed governmental control in 1996. The Higher Education Support Act 2003 made this abundantly clear, and that was further demonstrated following passage of the act through the Senate, despite opposition by Labor, the Greens and the Australian Democrats*, with the collaboration of the four independent senators – acting on AVCC advice. That collaboration was obtained by the government agreeing to review the method of indexation of block funding for universities.

That review was carried out by the Department of Education Science and Training, in cooperation with the Department of Finance and Administration, and in consultation with the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, and the Treasury.

It hardly came as a surprise that "the review considers that immediate consideration of further resourcing to the sector would be premature."

Clear-cut demonstrations of the Coalition's intention to choke-collar the university sector are the pressure by the government to reduce the power of union representation on university campuses and the forced introduction of Australian Workplace Agreements, the impending introduction of a Research Quality Framework, the composition of which will ultimately be determined by the Minister of Education, Science and Training in consultation with Cabinet in camera, the introduction of a lay committee with the power to overrule the bestowing of research grants through peer review by the Australian Research Council, and the exercising by the Minister to further overrule peer review should he choose (in both cases with no need for public justification).

And then there is the  threat of the peer review systems of the Australian Research Council and the National Health and Medical Research Council  becoming subservient to a Research Quality Framework politically directed.

Finally Brendan Nelson as the Minister for Education, Science and Training has himself pointed out several years ago that he is the instrument of the Prime Minister. The policies that are being implemented through Dr Nelson's Department emanate from the Prime Minister and that will continue for as long as John Howard retains the prime ministership regardless who is federal Minister for Education.

Make no mistake, John Howard is the toughest adversary Australia's academics and university sector have faced since federation.

*Note: the original version of this item which stated that the Australian Democrats voted for the Act was incorrect. TFW apologises for the error.