An extravagance of rectitude

Fiscal rectitude isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. But it beats rectal vicissitude.

ABC local radio in Sydney is playing “lingo bingo” this election. An on-air bell rings every time a politician incants one of 30 clichés including “moving forward”, “unAustralian” and “fiscal conservative”.

Lucky it didn’t include “fiscal rectitude”, or it would have sounded like it was stuck on a Tubular Bells loop. The Coalition has been giving the term a great workout, most recently in its response to the NTEU’s higher election policy survey.

“Fiscal rectitude” was invoked as the reason for both ruling out a 10 per cent increase in base funding for teaching, and refusing to commit to caps on student fees.

That’s no easy feat, because it’s not an easy thing to say. There’s the constant danger of accidental spoonerisms. Rectal vicissitude. Risky fortitude. Fossil platitude.

No matter what, say it once and it conjures up strange and lewd images.

The Coalition changed its tune, but stuck to the theme, in addressing the NTEU’s questions about improving student income support and indigenous scholarships.

Love to help, the coalition said. Unfortunately we can’t because of “the parlous state of the public finances” and “historic $57 billion deficit”.

Many would argue the Coalition was in fact a pillar of fiscal rectitude in its higher education spending during the Howard years.

Not so the Greens, whose current policies include abolishing all fees at public universities and TAFEs and forgiving all HECS and FEE-HELP debts while increasing education funding and income support.

The Greens, unburdened by the prospect of future government, supported all 12 of the NTEU’s policy positions on higher education and research, and another 22 on broader industrial relations, human rights, indigenous, work-life balance and environmental issues.

Family First matched the NTEU’s positions on 14 of the 22 broader issues and all 12 higher education and research issues. They included better student income support and funding for independent student representation – both areas in which Family First had recently blocked government reforms overwhelmingly supported by the sector.

Meanwhile the ALP refused to demean the NTEU’s survey with “simplistic yes/no replies”, instead opting for “comprehensive and detailed responses” that sometimes answered the question.

The ALP offered commitments where it could, and reviews where it couldn’t.

“A number of research projects and consultation strategies” are underway to address the sticky problem of replenishing the academic workforce.

This may not reassure university administrators dealing with the exodus of their baby boomer lecturers, disinterest from the younger generations and a postgraduate-proof fence at airport immigration desks.

A review of the ALP’s reviews – conducted by the Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations – counted at least 20 major higher education and research inquiries since 2007, yielding over 300 findings. The government has so far responded to less than a third of them, CAPA found.