Transcript - Sky Sunday Agenda

ANDREW CLENNELL: Well, joining me live now from Adelaide, where Anthony Albanese is giving that speech, is the Education Minister, Jason Clare. Jason Clare, thanks for joining me. Let's start with today's announcement. Why have you decided to cut the debt that these students would have expected to pay by 20%?

JASON CLARE, MINISTER FOR EDUCATION: G'day, mate. This is massive help for 3 million Australians right across the country with a student debt. People have got a university degree, or a TAFE qualification and it'll cut their debt by 20 per cent. 

The average debt at the moment is about $27,000, so that will cut their debt by more than $5,000. 

For somebody that's got a student debt of about $50,000, and there's plenty of people like that out there, then this will cut their debt by $10,000. 

When you and I were at university, back last century, university was a lot cheaper than it is today. Even in the early 2000s, it was cheaper. Back then, students contributed, on average, about 30 per cent to the cost of the degree, and taxpayers, the Government, contributed the other 70 per cent. 

Now it's more like a bit over 40 per cent that on average students contribute and the taxpayer, or the Government, contributes about 60 per cent. This fixes that. It fixes that for this generation of Australians, 3 million Australians who've got uni and TAFE qualifications over the last decade or so.

CLENNELL: Someone has to pay for this, and I assume it's taxpayers.

CLARE: This is the thing, whether it's TAFE or whether it's university, the individual benefits and the country benefits as well. That's why it's always been the case that we both chip in. It's why we've rolled out about half a million fee free TAFE places. Free TAFE places for Australians. But it's also why Australian taxpayers and the Government contributes to investing in our universities as well. 

The bottom line here is a lot of young Australians are doing it tough at the moment. They're just starting out, they've just finished their uni degree or just finished their TAFE qualifications, just leaving home, starting to pay rent, paying the bills, they've got to pay this bill, too. This will cut the cost of that bill and what we announced yesterday will make it easier to pay that off as well.

CLENNELL: Indeed. But if this is such a great initiative, why not? I mean, Parliament sits this week. Why not introduce the legislation now? Jason Clare, why say it's contingent on an election win? I mean, it effectively looks like an electoral bribe to younger people.

CLARE: We've got legislation in the Parliament right now that cuts student debt by $3 billion for 3 million Australians. That fixes the indexation formula. Everyone watching will remember that when inflation spiked last year, so did student debt. We're fixing that and wiping out what happened last year, making sure that it doesn't happen again. So, that legislation is in the Parliament right now. We want to see that done and finished and fixed by the end of the year. 

That bill also includes other big reforms like paid prac. So, for the first time ever, we're going to provide financial support for teaching students and nursing students and social work students while they do their practical training. That bill also includes something else that's important. Massively expanding the free courses that are effectively bridging courses for students between school and starting a university degree…

CLENNELL: Okay, but why save this for the election? Why tie this to an election?

CLARE: Just important to make the point that we're making changes to student debt in the Parliament right now. What Anthony will say today is that if we are re-elected, this will be the first piece of legislation that we introduce to the Parliament after the election. And it'll make a massive difference for a lot of young Australians right across the country. Not just young Australians, though. Everybody that has a student debt cut by 20 per cent.

CLENNELL: All right, a lot of young Australians would just like to see HECS fees cut, full stop. So, this obviously affects those who've accumulated the debt, who've graduated or are graduating. You spoke about when we went to university, my HECS debt was $9,500. Now, an arts degree can cost you 50 grand. Medicine or law degree can cost you 80 grand. Why not just cut those fees?

CLARE: There's more to do here as well, mate, that's the truth. As I said, there's legislation in the Parliament to help students at university right now with that paid prac that financial support while they do their training and those free courses. 

But what we've also said we would do is create an Australian Tertiary Education Commission to help us set those fees, fix the funding model for universities, and also provide universities with extra funding for students who are more likely to drop out to help them complete their degrees. And I hope to be in a position later this year to provide more detail on all of that.

CLENNELL: And lifting the threshold for paying it back from $54,000 a year to $67,000. What difference will that make? Because ultimately it means it takes longer to pay your debt back, doesn't it?

CLARE: Not necessarily. It always depends on the individual. And remember, this is the minimum that you have to pay if you want to pay more off you can. The bottom line with this reform, and this is a reform recommended by the Universities Accord Panel, recommended in fact by Bruce Chapman, who's the architect of HECS back in the 80s, is that it's designed to make sure that you start to pay off your university degree when university starts to pay off for you.

For a lot of young people, they're straight out of uni, they're on a low income, they're paying the rent, paying the bills, trying to save for a mortgage, trying to start a family, and they already have to start paying off their HECS bill. This gets them a little bit of relief, takes the pressure off, means that they don't have to start paying back that debt until they're earning $67,000 a year, which is about three quarters of the average graduate salary. And it means for somebody that might be on say $80,000 a year, that they're paying about $850 less a year than they have to at the moment. So, that's more money in their pocket rather than being in the Government's pocket to help them pay the rent and pay the bills.

CLENNELL: Well, just on that, is this policy a sign of how expensive housing and rents are that you've had to do this? And are you trying to take votes back or off the Greens here by appealing to younger people?

CLARE: I think it's just a simple fact that a lot of young people are doing it tough, doing it tougher than many other Australians. If they're straight out of uni and they're into the workforce and they've moved out and they've got to pay the rent and they've got this bill as well, then cutting that debt by 20 per cent and making it easier to pay off is going to help them. But it's also part of a bigger plan that we've got to build Australia's future. 

Back when Hawke and Keating were running the country, we saw a jump in the number of young people finishing high school from 40 per cent to almost 80 per cent. And that was nation changing stuff. It's made us smarter and stronger and wealthier as a country. And this Universities Accord report tells us that by the middle of this century, it's not going to be just 80 per cent of people that finish school. We're going to need a workforce where 80 per cent of people have finished school and then gone to TAFE or gone to university. And if we're going to build that workforce, then we've got to reform our education system, make it better and make it fairer. That's what the reforms in the Parliament are about. And this will help as well.

CLENNELL: Whose idea is 20 per cent? A 20 per cent cut? Is it yours? Is it the Prime Minister's? Did you look at 30 per cent? Did you look at 40 per cent? Did you look at 10 per cent?

CLARE: We looked at a range of different options, but they're decisions that are made by Cabinet, made by the ERC, and I'm not going to go into that detail.

CLENNELL: Did you want a greater cut? Did you want a bigger cut as Education Minister?

CLARE: No. Very, very simple here. I'm the education minister. I put this recommendation to my colleagues, and they've backed it, and I'm glad they have.

CLENNELL: All right, We've revealed Labor's slogan to be announced today is ‘Building Australia's future’. In 2022 it was ‘A better future’. Has Australia seen a better future between 2022 and 2024, particularly in light of 12 interest rate increases?

CLARE: We've made real progress on a number of important fronts. We've created a million new jobs in just over two years. That's more than any government ever has. We've cut inflation in half. When we came to office, inflation was high and going up. Now it's low and coming down back into the band that we've delivered two surpluses in a row, something the Liberal Party could only have ever dreamed of. And now we're starting to see real wages grow again. So, that's real progress, but it's just the start. 

What we'll be talking about today is what we want to do if we're privileged enough to win a second term, and that's building Australia's future. A big part of that is building the workforce, building the skills that we're going to need to build the next generation of Australians, to build Australia for the years ahead.

CLENNELL: Let me ask you about this issue of flight upgrades. I looked through your register. You declared a $15 bottle of wine and a phone charger at one stage. Jason Clare. But you did also declare - And do you really have to declare…

CLARE: …a pineapple I think.

CLENNELL: Okay. All right. But you did also declare an upgrade with Qantas in 2019 on a flight from Sydney to Singapore. Was that personal travel and how did that happen?

CLARE:  Yeah, good pickup, mate. That was a personal trip. And that was a situation where I had just got out of hospital, I had surgery on my leg and I asked for upgrade and I was assisted by Qantas.

CLENNELL: So, who do you ask in that scenario? 

CLARE: I remember picking up the phone and asking for a bit of assistance there, but I can't remember all of the details.

CLENNELL: Was it a government relations person or…?

CLARE: Probably. I don't want to mislead you, but I definitely asked for that, just to help me after the surgery.

CLENNELL: What do you make of this? Just on this. I don't want to labour too much time on this. Was your family on that trip with you? Did they also get an upgrade?

CLARE: No.

CLENNELL: Okay. It was a personal trip. Okay. By yourself? Or were they on another section of the flight? Were they with you?

CLARE: No, I had to go into hospital. You might remember that. I had a melanoma on my leg. I had to get it cut out. My family were overseas, I caught up with them as soon as I was allowed to. 

CLENNELL: Sure, ok. What do you make of this Joe Aston claim that Anthony Albanese got the upgrades from Alan Joyce? Obviously, a claim that the Prime Minister disputes.

CLARE: He said that that's not right. The bottom line here is declare it. And you've just gone through my declarations. If you get an upgrade or you're given anything else, you declare it, you fill out a form, you whack it on the internet and it's there for everybody to see.

CLENNELL: Why do you think it took the PM so long to shut this issue down? He could have easily come out that first press conference to say, no. I never contacted Alan Joyce about this. I mean, has it been a bad distraction for the government?

CLARE: He's gone out of his way to check and make sure that all of the questions that he answers are correct here, over more than a decade, to do the due diligence that you're supposed to do to make sure that you answer the questions correctly. You just asked me a question I didn't know the answer to. You've got the choice there that you make it up or you check. And that's what Anthony has done. It's a bit of a difference to what Peter Dutton did this week, when he was asked whether he'd asked Gina Rinehart to use the private plane, he said no, and then a couple of days later had to say that in fact, he had.

CLENNELL: And finally, Jason Clare what do you expect to happen in the US election this week? What would a Donald Trump win mean to Australia? Because on things like climate change, the US would be running in a whole separate direction, perhaps on Ukraine as well.

CLARE: This is a decision for the American people. If the polls are right, it's likely to be a very close result. Whatever happens would be good if it's a clear result for the United States. Whoever wins, though, it doesn't change the relationship between Australia and the United States. The United States is our closest ally, and that is a matter of bipartisan support. I'm sure Simon will tell you the exact same thing in a couple of minutes time. Whether it's a Labor government or a Liberal government in Australia or a Republican government or a Democratic government in the United States, we are the best of friends and closest of allies and that will continue.

CLENNELL: Education Minister Jason Clare, thanks so much for your time.

CLARE: Thanks, mate.