E&OE 

MICHAEL TETLOW: Opposition leader Peter Dutton is promising to cut the international number of students by 80,000 if elected. The proposal is the Coalition’s effort to tackle housing affordability. 

FAUZIA IBRAHIM: Now, to achieve the reduction, the Coalition is proposing to cap around 25 per cent on new foreign enrollments at public universities. Mr Dutton said the plan will slash the number of foreign enrolments to 240,000 students. 

PETER DUTTON: We’re here to announce on top of our 25 per cent cut to migration in this country which we have outlined previously. We are going to announce some changes in relation to international student numbers. Now, international student numbers are up by 65 per cent under this government over the last 12 months. And if you think about that, that is what has contributed to driving up of rents, particularly within Sydney and Melbourne, big capital cities otherwise. We want to provide support to regional universities and we’ll put in place a cap which will be 30,000 lower than what Labor has in place or 80,000 lower than what the numbers were just a couple of years ago. So, this is a very significant step we’re taking. It’s all about making sure that we can do what we can to help young Australians get into home ownership more quickly and how we can help with the rental crises that Labor has created as well.  

MICHAEL TETLOW: There’ll be some implications there for Australia’s universities and with some reaction we’re joined by CEO of Universities Australia Luke Sheehy. Luke, thanks for coming in the studio today. 

LUKE SHEEHY: Good to be with you. 

MICHAEL TETLOW: What would this mean for Australian universities? 

LUKE SHEEHY: Well, what we know is in the last 12 months both sides of politics have been in a bidding war to ruin this sector, to take a sledgehammer to international education in this country, which has served Australia’s interests unbelievably well for many decades. It’s driven our economic growth. We know that in 2023 alone we would’ve been in recession without it. Blaming international students for Australia’s housing crisis is a furphy. We need construction of housing, not destruction of this wonderful sector. 

MICHAEL TETLOW: Alright, so let’s look at what the opposition leader is and saying, and that is that young Australians can’t get into homes. Part of the reason is because there are too many international students, but where do those international students actually live? 

LUKE SHEEHY: Well, international students, we’re lucky in Australia that they enroll in both our cities and our regional communities all across Australia. We are beneficiaries of international students from over 140 countries. Since the opening up after COVID, we’ve seen a strong recovery, particularly in metropolitan areas. But it’s important to remember that international students only are six per cent of the private rental market in Australia. So, 94 per cent of the rest of the private rental market has nothing to do with international students. And our analysis shows that in metropolitan areas, the vacancy rates are higher than they are in other parts of the country. So, we need to get fair dinkum about whether or not international students are actually causing this housing crisis. Blaming this sector for a housing construction pipeline failure is not the way to go. 

MICHAEL TETLOW: It was put to Mr. Dutton that would he be comfortable with the loss of the economic input of foreign students and the number that was put to him was $72,000 a year. So, 80,000 students, 5.8 billion. Is that about right? Are those figures correct? 

LUKE SHEEHY: Well, they’re figures that we’ve used and it’s our analysis, more than $5 billion potential impact on Australia’s economy. We know that the sledgehammer approach from the government over the last 12 months has had more than a $4 billion impact on the Australian economy and the loss of thousands of jobs in Australia’s universities. International education turbocharges other industries including tourism and hospitality and importantly international students’ families come and spend time in Australia and spend their money, particularly in regional Australia. So, we have to think about the unintended consequences to continuing this race to the bottom on who can be tougher on international students from both sides of politics.  

MICHAEL TETLOW: There’s no doubt we’ve seen it for many years, almost a bidding war between state governments to bring in more international students because there’s money associated with it. If Western Australia, if New South Wales, Victoria want them to come in because they’re providing the economic stimulus, I guess it seems a surprising road to go down. Why do you think they’re doing it? 

LUKE SHEEHY: Well, we don’t want to catch the Canadian disease and in Canada what they did is cap international students and it’s driven down that important economic stimulus and important market for Canada’s economy. We don’t want to catch that disease in Australia. Worryingly today, the Coalition is proposing to increase the fees for international student fee applications. They’re already the world’s highest and they’re proposing to double them, if not quadruple them for some of our metropolitan research-intensive universities. This is really worrying. If you want more international students in regional Australia, in Western Australia and, importantly parts of the country like South Australia or Victoria that rely so heavenly on international education, then we are sending the wrong signals. I’ve been making the case all year that both sides of politics need to invest in higher education so we can succeed as a nation. International education makes up for billions of dollars of funding shortfalls because of years of systemic underinvestment in higher education. We can’t do the things that both sides of politics want us to do if we’re not properly funded and supported. Taking a sledgehammer and continuing to take a sledgehammer to international education beyond this year is not going to help us achieve any of those things they want us to achieve for them. 

MICHAEL TETLOW: Alright, Luke, we’ll see what comes out in the wash. Thank you so much for coming in today on Weekend Breakfast.  

LUKE SHEEHY: Great to be with you.  

ENDS