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 Give regional uni students certainty, Julia Tens of thousands of regional university students are being held hostage by the Federal Government over their university scholarships and income support, and time is running out to restore certainty. The Leader of The Nationals, Warren Truss, said it is cruel and inhumane that the Deputy Prime Minister and Education Minister, Julia Gillard, was playing such hardball with these students’ futures. “Ms Gillard and Labor created this mess, and they have to fix it,” Mr Truss said. “Labor scrapped Commonwealth scholarships last year but when they brought in the bill to replace them, they sneakily threw in changes to unwind the Independent Youth Allowance. Those youth allowance changes will stop at least 30,000 regional students from accessing support who have gone to work while undertaking a ‘gap year’. “There is a simple solution to this problem. If the Government splits the bill, I guarantee the Coalition will support the part that provides the scholarships to students. There’s no controversy here – or shouldn’t be for Labor. “For the rest of the legislation that is controversial, a separate bill should be created. We’ll keep talking about those elements. “Rest assured, the Coalition will not be supporting the bill as it stands. Labor is holding students hostage and only the Government can fix this problem that is scaring the living daylights out of students and their parents. “Fixing the Youth Allowance debacle should have been one of the government’s highest priorities when Federal Parliament resumed this week. But Ms Gillard has failed to take any action and only says that legislation will be returned to Parliament ‘as soon as possible’. “The Prime Minister said on election night that he would ‘govern for all Australians’. Well, as it stands, he’s not including regional people and he’s excluding regional youth from his so-called ‘education revolution’. “Last month a Senate Committee inquiry chaired by Nationals Senator Fiona Nash made eight recommendations including the implementation of a Tertiary Access Allowance worth $10,000 per year for students forced to move away from home to attend university. “The Government would be well advised to consider these recommendations and stop holding prospective students hostage,” Mr Truss said. |
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