Senate Education and Employment Legislation Committee, , 1:06:46 to 1:29:46
The National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) raises concerns about ministerial influence over commissioner appointments and the need for ATEC to be a truly independent statutory authority.
Topics: Education, Public service staffing
Speakers: Dr Terri MacDonald, Mehreen Faruqi, Kieran McCarron, Marielle Smith, Unknown Speaker
>> Thank you very much for your evidence today. We always appreciate your um candid contributions to our committee's work. The um I don't believe you took Quans, but if you did, we're asking for them back by the 20th of February 2026. Um senators I'm proposing a amendment to the program. So that is that we will suspend now for approximately 10 minutes in which time I'll seek to get our next witness on early. Um this is in an effort to expand the last session of the day. So if you just note on your programs there's just a bit of an amendment there. Um thank you all. We All right. Hi there. I think we've got our friends from the NTEU on the line. If you are, if you could pop your video Do we have the NTU there? Ah, here we Hello. Hello. Can you hear me? Okay. >> Beautiful. All right. Um, well, I would like to welcome you both, Dr. McDonald and Mr. McCarron. Thank you for joining us today and for facilitating jumping on a bit early for us. Um, we've been asking witnesses to table their opening statements. Are you in a position to do that or did you need to present your
Uh we're fine to take a look.
>> Okay. Thank you. In that case, uh we'll jump straight into questions. Um I've got some questions, but Senator Fricky, I'm happy for you to go first if you like.
>> Um thank you, Chair. Um good morning, comrades. Good to see you. Uh I might start with some questions uh about what you said in your submission first. Um, so in your submission you note the NTEU's support for the accord recommendation that there be an A tech established and that it is an independent statutory authority to enable it to provide robust advice and support evidence-based decision-m and planning. Um, you go on to state in your submission that you disagree with the government's assertion that formal independence is a foundational element of the AEX design. Could you elaborate on us uh a bit more on that that why do you disagree? Uh we have heard from others why they disagree but it' be good
>> Sorry I was having trouble um unmuting myself. Um, look, there's there's a number of structural structural issu is issues with um the way that a tech is set out in the bill and I think it goes directly to the fact that um you know as we say in our submission it's effectively housed within the department of education. um it is not a a stature it's not a an independent body um in the you know the sense that um I think universities accord had recommended um we had something in mind similar to like the productivity commission uh in terms of how that would be structured and what kind of you know authority and powers that would have particularly to undertake its own investigations we thought was actually an important thing for a tertiary um regulator to have >> um or a or a entity that's charged with the stewardship of the um of the sector. It seems to be how it's um phrased. Um so putting it within the department even though there are commissioners and look you know there there are some protections built into the into the legislation and we recognize that but from the outset it is very much intended to be uh something which will be carrying out the policy directors of government um and not um independent in the way that we and I would say the universities accord had also um uh sort of like advocated for um Kieran do you have anything to
>> um I think the other issue was the uh the ministerial appointment of the commissioners and
>> yes
>> there's a bit of ambiguity around uh there's a bit of potential to remove commissioners I think in the bill um and so there's a little bit of trust involved in that and there's also the ministerial direction uh of a tech I suppose how that might affect their ability to be fully independent.
>> Mhm. Could I just ask you um to clarify in terms of the appointment of commissioners and who is able to remove them? What would be your recommendation
mir mirroring the productivity commission model would ensure a stronger level of independence. Um so my understanding is it's very hard for if there's a change of government for the new government to remove the productivity commissioners. I think that would be very difficult. >> Um I think in this bill it seems like there is some potential ways in which a change of government could lead to a change of commissioners um which which we wouldn't.
>> Yep. Okay. Um I just want to go to um your submission which talks about in quite detail the national tertiary education objective and we've discussed that a bit this morning. Um you have welcomed that objective but criticized it for its narrow scope and others have as well. Uh and you say that the NTEO may inadvertently limit the missions of public universities and undermine institutional independence. Do you think it should be expanded to make explicit the public mission and the educational, social, research and civic functions of higher education? Because at the moment it actually does not and it's a good opportunity I feel and it came up quite a bit in the inquiry into university governance as well u the importance of a tech having that as an objective. So
Yeah, look in our submission we are critical of the fact that um the um the objective actually doesn't mention education at all. Um it doesn't mention research at all. It doesn't mention innovation um and the kinds of critical um inquiry um you know and um you know sort of like forward thinking that our you know public universities um provide doesn't talk about the importance of public education um you know or even the importance of of the transformative nature of education itself. So you know not just for the individual but for more broad broadly you know socially and economically environmentally and all the other things it likes to touch on but it doesn't talk about education. So that in itself is an issue. We also of course have concerns around things like academic freedom >> um and critical inquiry and the importance of those in a mission um and the need for that to be you know um baked into what you know universities are doing. Um so I think those um issues certainly do need to be uh looked at further um and we would like to have um that particular objective but the thing we talk about in our um in our submission you know in particular is the need for sector consultation and I understand that this would come under that uh but this is when we're looking at um what is you know a a bill that's ready to go uh we think that um you know what was and we did have consultation with the university's accord but Unfortunately, the recommendations of that university court have not actually sort of played through to to this legislation fully and I think that's a
>> And what's your view on research? I mean, we've heard this morning and I have been for years really concerned about, you know, how universities are are really the funding cuts have hampered them in doing um research. But this bill doesn't really seem to address research much. Should research be an explicit explicitly outlined in the bill as well as as a responsibility of a
>> Um I'll say something and I'll know that Kieran will probably want to say something because he's done a fair bit in the research area. Um look I think yes and and to a certain extent and maybe a little bit no because yes research has to be recognized and research does need to be certainly um you know supported and championed even uh by governments and I have to say that our experience um over multiple governments is that um research has certainly fallen behind even the universities of core didn't look very seriously into research which was very disappointing um but by the same token um you know there's the ARC there's the NHMRC there are other entities which do have um you know oversight over what happens in our research area. So we do need to have a little bit of of of a mind around that. I think though um the big problem for is is the research that happens outside of what you know the NHMRC and the ARC are doing that is what the universities are doing themselves. Um and you know what happens with that and what support is in that it used to be before the jobs for any graduate changes that um you know a certain component of of CTS funding was you know recognized is supportive indirectly of research and of course that was removed. Uh so now universities you know have very little avenue aside from what they can you know um you know generate themselves um and that of course favors particular institutions over others. um you know uh I think um you know there needs to be a really in-depth look at what we're happening what is happening through research but uh by the same token you know um the a tech you know would need to be you know cognizant of those other um entities Kira I know you've written stuff on um research reviews lately
>> I think that I um just add senator that um the bill mentions a tech having a role around international student numbers and I I suppose that area is a bit of a an area of uh potential issue for research given that so much research is crossf funded uh by international student fees. Um it's not a great system. It's not a system that anyone really asked for. It's it's what we've ended up with with you know government funding cuts over time. and the universities have just kind of done what they had to do. Um, and they've gone down this path now. Um, and we're kind of stuck in this spot where, you know, you wouldn't want a tech to come in and start arbitrarily capping international student numbers and and uh inadvertently impacting research and teaching for domestic students as well. So I think anybody that has been asked to look at international student numbers can't ignore how that is linked to research. So I I don't see how you can look at one and not the other given the state that we've ended up in.