2 weeks Ago
PETER VAN ONSELEN: Why Albanese's $16billion gift to the Australians who need it LEAST is his dumbest move yet. Here's what he should have done instead Labor announces plan to pay 20 per cent off HECS debts Will only happen if the party is re-elected READ MORE: 2024 bad? 2025 is going to be even tougher By Peter van Onselen, Political Editor for Daily Mail Australia Published: 01:01 GMT, 4 November 2024 | Updated: 01:01 GMT, 4 November 2024 e-mail 47 View comments So Labor, in its infinite wisdom, has decided to wipe 20 per cent off HECS debts, putting the bill for doing so on the taxpayer's tab. Anyone and everyone who has a current HECS debt will have one fifth of it forgiven.
But only if Labor is re-elected. If Labor loses, no debt forgiveness. If Labor wins, the taxpayers' dollars flow to university graduates.
It is an extension of middle-class welfare at the expense of the needs and hard slog of the working class. Why the brazen election bribe? The Albanese government is worried about university graduates voting for the Greens, so it has developed a policy designed to win those voters back to the Labor fold. But it comes at the expense of Labor's one-time working-class base: voters who haven't gone to uni but might hope that one day their children will.
They get nothing, and their kids will get nothing either, because this election bribe is a one-off designed to help Anthony Albanese win a second term. It is also about moving the narrative on from Albanese's nearly two dozen Qantas business-class upgrades that dominated the news cycle last week. Unfortunately for Labor, when Education Minister Jason Clare announced the policy over the weekend, he was also forced to admit he had asked for a business-class upgrade on a flight to Singapore .
So just how fair is this $16billion one-off cost to taxpayers? If Labor loses, no debt forgiveness. If Labor wins, the taxpayers' dollars flow to university graduates. It is an extension of middle-class welfare at the expense of the needs and hard slog of the working class, writes Peter van Onselen Unfortunately for Labor, when Education Minister Jason Clare announced the policy on the weekend, he was also forced to admit that he had asked for a business class upgrade on a flight to Singapore If you never went to uni, you get nothing.
You do, however, get to help cover the cost of the debt relief going to all those university graduates who studied anything from culture and gender studies to art appreciation and climate change. Anyone who was curious about the sociological impact of changing attitudes towards pottery - and devoted three years of higher education study to sociology before adding a fourth honours year to really burrow into some of the pressing unanswered questions on this specific topic - will get a 20 per cent reduction on their HECS debt. Manual workers in outer metropolitan seats, meanwhile, get nothing.
Nor do retail workers or casual and part-time workers in the hospitality sector, or anyone else who doesn't benefit from the higher wages university graduates enjoy across their working lives. Only those uni graduates get the benefits from this $16billion election bribe. Think about that.
If you were less fortunate and didn't go to uni, instead breaking your back in a manual-labour job straight out of high school, this policy gives you absolutely nothing - except more national debt you and your children will pay for. Those graduating from university degrees, so the data tells us, go on to earn more than non-university workers, and they thus live more affluent lives. Yet non-uni graduates are paying for this debt relief for uni graduates who are more than capable of doing so on their own.
A current lawyer earning a six-figure income who hasn't paid off their HECS debt yet will get a 20 per cent reduction if Labor is re-elected. If you already paid your HECS debt off, you also get nothing. Too bad for working hard to erode the debt more quickly, if that's what you did.
Or if you just happened to be a little bit older and are further into your working life, now saving to buy a home, you also get nothing from Albo's election bribe. If you're heading to university next year and beyond, you get nothing either. This change isn't structured such that it will make your life easier via some sort of long-term future investment in higher education.
You get nothing from this policy if you are a young Australian yet to start at uni, probably because you're currently not quite of voting age. So if higher education costs are the government's real concern, they are doing sweet bugger all on that issue into the future, writes Peter van Onselen So if higher education costs are the government's real concern, they are doing sweet bugger all on that issue into the future. The fact this policy is universally applied to all uni graduates, not just those who did targeted degrees, is perhaps the worst feature.
Anyone who studied nursing, primary and secondary education, or social work have done so to contribute to the caring and training needs of the nation. Such university graduates sacrifice future earnings to study in areas that make societal contributions without huge pay packets. But they get no more from this blatant pork barrelling attempt than future lawyers, finance bros and plastic surgeons.
These sorts of careers can earn university graduates upwards of a million bucks a year, yet they all get a 20 per cent reduction in their HECS debts, paid for by the bricklayer, labourer or gardener servicing the investment property of the finance bro out at lunch. It's a policy joke so embarrassing that Team Albo should be ashamed. Economists such as Professor Steven Hamilton and Chris Richardson have respectively described it as 'stupid' and 'dumb'.
But it is so much worse than that. It is a political party using your taxpayer dollars to try and buy its re-election. It should be illegal but it's not.
It is dumb economic policy designed to be clever politics, by a government that hopes voters are either too stupid to realise how unfair the bribe is, or too selfish to care because they personally benefit. But maybe Australians will send this cynical Labor government an unambiguous message, and pour scorn on it for attempting to buy an election win with more debt. Those who came up with this idea are so economically illiterate they think that because HECS debts are 'off budget', forgiving $16billion worth of them doesn't cost anything.
Read More PETER VAN ONSELEN: Think 2024 has been tough? This is why 2025 is going to be much worse It is too stupid for words. Just because a liability is off budget doesn't mean that it costs nothing. This policy is also cynical politics because of the timing of the announcement.
Six months out from polling day but it won't take effect unless Labor is re-elected? What obvious pork barrelling. It has clearly been rushed out now because Labor is down in the polls and distracted by the Qantas upgrades scandal. The idiocy of this policy doesn't end here.
Because it is universally applied to anyone with a HECS debt, even those now living overseas with no intention of ever returning to contribute to the Australian economy get a 20 percent cut to their HECS debts! We will find out when senate estimates sits how this policy was contrived in the first place. I'm willing to bet that the professional public service had little to do with it. It is a brazenly politically-designed handout, hoping to win votes amongst HECS debt holders.
Remember: your children who might be planning to attend university in the years to come get no benefit from this policy whatsoever - a sure sign that it isn't designed as some sort of fix for the system. It is purely about buying votes. Qantas Anthony Albanese Share or comment on this article: PETER VAN ONSELEN: Why Albanese's $16billion gift to the Australians who need it LEAST is his dumbest move yet.
Here's what he should have done instead e-mail Add comment.
