Universities commercial operations to be brought in line with standards

CAPA salutes the twenty-ninth recommendation of the Senate Committee report, Universities in Crisis, that universities commercial operations conform to standards expected of private enterprise.

"As we have entered the murky waters of commercial activity conducted by statutory public institutions, some activities have been planned and conducted without due regard to broadly accepted standards of operation," said CAPA President John Byron today.

"Some university administrators have embraced commercial modes of operation with unbridled enthusiasm, as the great saviour from the yoke of government regulation," he explained.

"In reality, public management of public institutions is most effective, and the market-based alternatives are really only attractive because the present Government has so thoroughly abdicated its responsibilities."

Problems have arisen because some universities have engaged in commercial activity, or have re-oriented their existing operations along commercial lines, without due regard to the regulatory requirements imposed upon private enterprise in order to protect consumers and the public interest.

"Full, up-front fees for postgraduate coursework degrees is an excellent example," according to Mr Byron. "Universities have eagerly taken Dr Kemp's thirty pieces of silver, and charged students significant sums to replace the operating grant funding that the Coalition has so disgracefully stripped from the system.

"However, many institutions have failed to realise that they assume obligations under Trades Practices Acts as soon as they begin to sell a product or service - in this case, a course of education - in the marketplace.

"As a result of some of their more outrageous practices - such as merely rebadging undergraduate courses “ some universities are heading for serious problems under their trading obligations," he said.

"Nobody wants to see universities being sued by students, but the honeymoon period is over during which universities can avoid observing commercial proprieties and yet be treated as special cases."

Research spin-off companies, customised training programmes, dodgy floats of enterprises, and special cosy research contract arrangements with part-owned entities are some of the other vulnerable activities.

"Proper standards of operation need to be instituted and policed, but the most radical and visionary action any Government could take would be to reinvest in, and properly manage, our public education system “ the engine room of Australia's future economic, social and environmental prosperity.

"It is all too clear that the Howard Government is both unwilling to make this investment, and incapable of managing the system," he concluded. "It is up to Australians who care about our future, and the future of generations to come, to use their votes accordingly on election day."