Budget bailout for Australian private colleges

Australia’s government has unveiled a suite of measures to help private higher education colleges stay afloat following last month’s expiry of the JobKeeper pandemic wage subsidy scheme.

Canberra will spend AS$54 million (£30 million) to extend grant allocations and fee freezes implemented as part of last April’s higher education relief package.

Private providers will be funded to deliver another 5,000 short courses on top of the 1,015 bankrolled last year, while regulatory charges will be waived for a further six months – extending the fee holiday until the end of 2021.

The government will also waive the 20 per cent fee on private college tuition loans until the end of the year, in a move expected to benefit 30,000 students. And it will roll out an “innovation grant fund” to help providers improve their offerings online and abroad.

The measures, to be formalised in the 11 May federal budget, follow intense lobbying from private sector representative groups.

While universities have been hard hit by the border closures that have choked the flow of foreign students, many independent providers – particularly English language colleges – have been devastated, with only JobKeeper shielding some from bankruptcy. But the last payments from the scheme were distributed in mid-April.

Representative group Independent Higher Education Australia said that the additional measures were a “huge” relief. “As uncertainty continues around the return of international students, it is becoming even more critical to stimulate domestic education markets,” said chief executive Simon Finn.

“Waiving regulatory fees will particularly benefit the small and niche providers who continue to grapple with the impacts of Covid-19.”

Mr Finn said that the additional subsidised short courses would encourage education businesses to tailor their efforts toward local needs, while the new innovation fund would help safeguard the sector’s ongoing viability.

“There’s no doubt that the impacts of the pandemic on the international higher education industry will be felt for many years to come. The longer borders remain closed to student visa holders, the longer industry recovery will take,” Mr Finn said.

But he said that the “unfair” loan fee, which only applies to unsubsidised students, should be axed permanently. “We will continue to advocate for this tax to never be reintroduced.”

john.ross@timeshighereducation.com