Fed: unis could divide into league ladder based on fees - Go8

AAP General News (Australia)
12-05-2003
Fed: unis could divide into league ladder based on fees - Go8

CANBERRA, Dec 5 AAP - Australian universities could divide into a football-style league
ladder based on the fees they charged, the head of the Group of Eight sandstone universities
Professor Ian Chubb said today.

But he hoped a two-tiered system would not emerge.

Professor Chubb, who is also vice-chancellor of the Australian National University,
was commenting on the passage of the federal government's ground-breaking, $10 billion
Higher Education Support Bill last night.

The bill still has to undergo formal procedures but has technically been accepted.

A key plank is allowing universities to set fees for HECS courses incorporating increases
of up to 25 per cent.

Professor Chubb said the ANU would not charge full fees, although he could not say
what would happen in the longer term.

"I'll certainly be recommending that we maintain our present position on full fees,
which is not to charge them, and that we sit back and see what happens with respect to
the other side of it," he told ABC radio.

"I just don't think that, even having thought about it for months, I could predict
what the outcome (in four or five years) is likely to be."

He hoped there would not now be a two-tiered system in Australia based on a willingness
to charge fees.

"It would be absurd if we divided the system up because people perceive some institutions
are better simply because they charge fees," Professor Chubb said.

"It may well begin to divide, whether it's into groups or just a league ladder, as
it were, but I would hope that we can get the message out that it's not an issue of price
that determines the quality of an institution."

Professor Chubb welcomed the scrapping of hardline industrial relations provisions in the bill.

"(The inclusion of the IR clauses) wasn't only bad, it was silly," he said.

Education Minister Brendan Nelson said the package would deliver to universities more
than 34,000 fully-funded HECS places and $2.4 billion over the next five years.

The increased new public funding would be close to $11 billion over 10 years.

"Just as importantly, it will deliver much needed reform, freeing universities to grow
in areas of expertise, reducing class sizes and finally placing the student at the centre
of the university experience," Dr Nelson said.

The Australian Vice-Chancellors' Committee said the deal struck between the government
and senators last night gave the package acceptable form.

"It is good news for our staff, it gives certainty, it puts new money into our system,
it's good news for our students," AVCC president Deryck Schreuder said.

AAP dep/sb/sco/de

KEYWORD: UNIVERSITIES SECOND DAYLEAD

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