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Dr Nelson wants total control of universities
Dr Brendan Nelson, federal Minister for Education, has signalled plans to use the Government's new control of the Senate to take over control of the university system from the States, to ban compulsory student unionism, and ban unions from negotiating pay scales for academic staff, as well as ban strikes. In a move that has no doubt taken the Minister entirely by surprise, the tertiary education unions have responded by threatening to strike, and some of the States have also indicated that the plan is a bad idea™.
I am having some difficulty identify any valid head of Federal power on which he would base such a move, unless he plans to enter into a treaty with some other nation regarding the structuring of our educational system. No doubt the President of Nauru can expect a phone call offering money in return for signing on to such a thing.
On the other hand, with the way the Howard Government wants to scale back university education, perhaps they are planning to outsource the whole thing to somewhere like Nauru.
Either way, it seems unlikely they will be able to achieve this plan without either getting co-operation from the States or doing something entirely untoward. With Carr having offered to give the Commonwealth health in return for the States getting full control of education, it seems unlikely that New South Wales will agree.
This is bothering me more
The more I think about this, the more it bothers me. Even though I cannot see it happening due to the constitutional issues, the attempt strikes me as dangerous. Howard has consistently railed against "the elites", by which he means intellectuals - like Bush, Howard fears and resents smart people. Many of the "elites" Howard so reviles operate out of universities, which have long been structured so as to encourage academics to express their genuine views. That is why universities have a system of tenures - so that academics can feel free to express their views without fear of reprisal.
In the ideal right-wing Liberal world, tenures would be abolished because they can be abused. You get the occasional tenured lecturer or professor who just stops putting in the effort. But that does not mean abolishing tenures is a good idea - the goal served by tenures is a worthy one, and unless there is some other way of ensuring that our top thinkers can express their views without fear, they need to stay.
But the attack on tenures is not just in synch with the policy of Howard's right-wing of the Liberal Party - it is something that would suit Howard. What better way to deal with the "elites" than by putting their futures under his Government's direct control. Take control of the university system, effectively abolish the tertiary education unions, abolish tenures, and then the Government can apply pressure to academics to prevent the "elites" from airing views that Howard disagrees with.
The Government already has its channels for airing its own views. It is vital to a free nation for other views to be aired in an environment where top thinkers can feel safe doing so. At least now we have a variety of universities operating under seven different governments (6 state governments, and the federal), which creates competition among the systems of the various states such that pressure could not be applied on academics in one state without impacting on the ability of that state's universities to provide education. If it is all under the Federal Government, and they choose to apply pressure of this kind, then the only real alternative for academics needing to air different views is to go overseas, where they will be unable to effectively contribute to domestic debate.