The Albanese government continues to shirk action on the worst remnant of the Morrison-era changes to higher education.

By continuing to ignore the urgent need to undo the Job-Ready Graduates scheme, the government is retaining a policy that harms the financial security and living standards of millions of young Australians. 

Some 2.9 million Australians carry, on average, more than $27,000 in HECS debts.

Student contributions for courses like commerce and law are nine times higher than they were in 1989, a time when many members of this parliament graduated.

Australians are graduating with $50,000 in HECS debts from conventional three-year bachelor degrees – $80,000 after postgraduate studies – and taking a decade or more to pay them off.

Graduate salaries have increased by about 2½ times since 1996 – in that time, student contributions have increased six-fold.

How did it get this bad? The simple answer is, fees have increased over time as the threshold for repayment has decreased.

In 2021, the Morrison government turbocharged student debt when it introduced the Job-Ready Graduates scheme, doubling the cost of our most popular degrees, like humanities, business, law, communications and social sciences.

HECS........

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