SBS: Millions of Australians are facing a huge student debt hike. Now, there’s a push to stop it

Original Article

KEY POINTS

• Inflation is expected to see student debt levels in Australia rise even higher.
• Advocates warn more graduates ‘will spend their entire lives repaying their student debt’.
• A federal parliamentary committee is considering changes to indexation and repayments.

Australian university graduates could face the biggest increase to their student debt in decades due to rising inflation.

But a federal parliamentary committee is examining a bill that would abolish the indexation of student debts to inflation and raise the minimum income required to start loan repayments.

Australia’s higher education loan system is tied to inflation and increases in line with the consumer price index (CPI), currently at 7.8 per cent.