Editorial-20 January 2002

Twelve days before the November 10^th election Professor Ian Chubb, President of The Australian Vice-Chancellors' Committee and Vice-Chancellor of the Australian National University addressed the South Australian branch of the Committee for the Economic Development of Australia; his theme: Our Universities: Our Future. Armed with a 36 slide PowerPoint presentation he got right to the point.

In making his announcement about the election Australia's Prime Minister, Mr. Howard, emphasised that the election would be one of great importance for Australia's future...

Unfortunately, the portents are not good. Notwithstanding the fact that the Prime Minister indicated publicly after the release of Backing Australia's Ability that he considered the measures taken in that document were but a 'first step' - Mr. Howard's expression - and that we should expect more, it seems that this will not now happen.

In an interview in the Sydney Morning Herald on the weekend, Mr. Howard argued that the Government is investing in universities through its Backing Australia's Ability program and he was critical of Vice Chancellors for what he said was our lack of industrial reform and inefficiency. To quote what he is reported to have said:

"You can spend still more and the Vice-Chancellors will always want to spend more. It would be a good idea if they improved the industrial relations practices of their universities and made them a bit more efficient. That would help enormously."

The Vice-Chancellor went on to say,

And then Ian Chubb brought up some home truths: "in 1985 Australia's level of investment [based on GDP] in knowledge was at 85.1% of the total applying to the US. In 1998 the level was 70.5%. Our ratio to that of the OECD was somewhat better but has fallen over the same period from 87% to around 75%."

"Including ourselves in a suite of 13 OECD countries that we might normally compare ourselves with - Austria, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, Sweden, UK, US - we rate 3rd last, only better than Austria and Italy."

And almost as a throw-away-line, "Average government funding for our universities is now around 50% or lower, [that's] lower than government funding for private schools (which is around 55%)."

Professor Chubb, mindful of whom he was addressing went on to point out, " I mentioned in my opening remarks that we could see in the Prime Minister's remarks an attitude which continues to see education purely in terms of being a deficit on the accounts ledger. Yet there is strong evidence to counter this view.

"[Professor Bruce] Chapman [addressing the National Press Club] referred to a study by Hanushek and Kimko (2000) to test the extent to which educational quality as measured by standardised scores for mathematical and scientific literacy has contributed to economic growth differences averaged over thirty years across 139 countries. Their results suggest, for example, that growth in GDP per capita would have been around one per cent higher per annum if Australia had the average workforce quality of the average of the other 139 countries considered."

That's a damning indictment on those who have been responsible for our economic welfare since the early '70s.

Chapman also pointed out in his NPC address that Government operating grants to the universities have fallen further and further behind relative to the population's average weekly earnings. The graph below shows that in 2001 this differential had opened up to over half a billion dollars.

In the meantime the number of students has risen from 600,000 to 700,000 and student staff ratios have climbed from 14.5 to 1 to 19.4 to 1.

Professor Chubb concluded his talk to the Committee for the Economic Development of Australia (SA branch) by quoting Richard Butler, Australia's former Ambassador for disarmament and Chair of the UN Commission to disarm Iraq, "to defeat the limitation of our small scale in this new economic division of labour, and 'ensure the future [that] Australians believe to be their birth right,' we will need to 'create in our people the highest proportion of highly educated, skilled scientists, inventors and researchers to be found in any comparable country' " Professor Chubb then added, "I hope Butler is not offended if I say that what he has said is less significant for its content than for the fact he has said it. [I]t is very significant [that] a person so intimately involved in the 'sharp end' of security issues should see our future in these educational terms."

From the events of the past several months the Coalition doesn't appear to have seen matters quite that way with Labor having followed meekly behind.

Having witnessed the Government's heaping contumely on the Senate committee's report, "Universities in Crisis" and read Professor Chubb's palpable sigh of near resignation, "It is unfortunately the case that we live in the time of the 'they would say that syndrome,' " it is hard to avoid the conclusion that the Government led by Prime Minister Howard, not only doesn't understand, it has no desire to understand. If an initiative doesn't gain significant voter "Brownie Points" during the three years of a parliamentary term it is not to be pursued, irrespective of its merit. Just over a year ago we introduced The Funneled Web saying, "Don't expect our elected leaders to show overly much initiative. Indications are that much policy and budget commitment is based on commissioned opinion polls. We have to show the pollsters who in turn can pass the information up the line." Apart from some gilding of an acutely wilting lily, little appears to have changed.

Surely by this time the Australian Vice-Chancellors' Committee, Australian Academy of Science, Group of Eight, Federation of Australian Scientific and Technological Societies, indeed anyone or any organisation challenged with the responsibility to reverse the crises facing our higher education system and research and development prowess has realized that the Federal Government isn't listening, and has no intention of listening as matters stand. A concerted effort is required to gain the backing of the Australian People and that requires putting into motion strong, effective mechanisms to inform and to lobby. Efforts such as Science meeting Parliament once a year or talks to the Committee for Economic Development of Australia are all well and good - but they ain't enough to do the job.

Australia's future hangs in the balance.