FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 2026
17th March 2026 – The Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations (CAPA) today welcomed the official release of the Ambitious Australia Final Report from the Strategic Examination of Research and Development (SERD). The report is set to recommend a $50,000 per year stipend for PhD candidates in national priority areas, and removing taxation on all part-time PhD stipends. These recommendations reflect a direct response to sustained advocacy efforts by CAPA on behalf of 570,000 postgraduate students. CAPA calls on the Government to urgently implement recommendations 12a, 12b and 17 of the report.
Recommendation 12b provides for 1,000 full-time equivalent PhD places in fields related to the National Innovation Pillars to receive a $50,000 annual stipend — a rise significantly above the current the current 2026 RTP minimum of $34,315, which now falls below the Henderson Poverty Line ($690.50 per week, September 2025). The six eligible pillars are: Health and Medical; Agriculture and Food; Defence; Environment and Energy; Resources; and Technology. Critically, CAPA foresees that this increased investment may free up institutional funding to top up stipends for candidates in non-priority areas. This targeted investment would lift the floor for everyone. The report also recommends the government commits to increasing stipends for all PhD students, which CAPA recommended and modelled in its 2026-2027 Pre Budget Submission. Recommendation 12b also extends tax-free status for research scholarships to part-time recipients – a reform CAPA has long championed.
“The $50,000 per year dollar figure outlined by Ambitious Australia marks a significant step forward in policy to support research students. The current minimum Research Training Stipend barely meets the poverty line. Ambitious Australia envisions an Australia where the research future is bright,” said Maxim Buckley, CAPA Policy and Research Advisor
“This is what advocacy looks like when it works. CAPA has made the case, loudly and backed by data, that you cannot ask the brightest minds in the country to live below the poverty line in exchange for advancing Australian science. Today, the Government is beginning to listen,” said Jesse Gardner-Russell, CAPA National President.
“This is a generational win for postgraduate students. We have worked alongside our partners at Universities Australia, The Australian Council for Graduate Research and individual universities to present a united front on raising the stipend.”
CAPA Board Chair Gemma Lucy Smart welcomed the extension of tax-free scholarships to part-time recipients as a long-overdue equity measure: “The SERD panel has rightly recognised that taxing part-time research scholarships is a massive barrier in the way of disadvantaged students. CAPA has been campaigning on this issue for years. Students from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander backgrounds, with caring responsibilities, and/or living with disabilities are disproportionately the ones studying part-time and bearing that tax burden. We strongly support this recommendation and look forward to seeing it implemented.”
Recommendation 12a calls for universities, in partnership with industry, to design and deliver inclusive research training programs with a strong industry focus. CAPA supports this direction, however, additional embedded coursework must be matched by an equivalent extension of the RTP stipend and fee offset period. Industry-integrated training must be an opportunity for candidates, not an additional unpaid burden. CAPA will also continue to advocate for the Industry Linked PhD program to be expanded to represent at least 5 per cent of yearly PhD enrolments, up from less than 1 per cent today. Universities will also lead the development and provision of industry and entrepreneurial PhD models and training at scale, which re-define success to include creating a research startup.
“Encouraging high-risk, high-reward entrepreneurialism is a great step towards modernising the PhD. We look forward to working with Universities Australia and other stakeholders to help turn Australia into a start-up nation,” said said Jesse Gardner-Russell, CAPA National President
“Moving to a modern view of what success in research training looks like, is a welcome recommendation. Entrepreneurial students should be rewarded for developing start-ups, not punished.”
Recommendation 17 calls for grants and funding processes to be simplified, standardised, and modernised through improved technology. CAPA has advocated for exactly this reform. In 2012, NHMRC applicants alone spent an estimated 550 working years preparing submissions at a salary cost of approximately $66 million. A unified digital access point and 2-stage application process for all major RD&I grants would substantially reduce this.
“Saving principal investigators time and energy, from burdensome grant applications, gives our members more time and support from their supervisors,” said Gardner-Russell.
The case for reform is clear. CAPA’s modelling, validated against the 2025 CWTS Leiden rankings, demonstrates a direct relationship between the RTP stipend rate and national research productivity. Between 2006 and 2016, Australian research productivity grew by approximately 121%, well above the OECD average of 39%. Between 2013 and 2023, that growth fell to 64%. Productivity has effectively flat-lined. The last meaningful surge followed the Rudd Government’s 2010 decision to lift the stipend to the Henderson Poverty Line. Raising the rate to minimum wage equivalent (~$43,000) would, per CAPA’s modelling, deliver the largest single boost to research productivity in recent memory.
HDR candidates contribute 54% of all university research hours while representing only 8.5% of R&D expenditure. Thirteen universities still have candidates living below the poverty line. A survey of over 8,000 University of Melbourne postgraduates found that three-quarters identified cost-of-living as their primary concern. A research system reliant on financially stressed candidates is not efficient, it is self-sabotaging. The public budget office estimates that lifting the RTP to minimum wage for all PhD candidates would cost approximately $300 million per year. We estimate that funding 1000 RTP stipends at $50,000 would cost an additional $16 million per year.
“A happy workforce is a productive workforce. Research students are overworked, underpaid, and stressed. Increasing the stipend will support research students properly, allowing them to focus on their job: research” said Maxim Buckley, CAPA Policy and Research Advisor
Critically, there are many details missing in the final report. CAPA calls for urgent Government clarification on the following:
• ‘Fields related to the pillars’ remain undefined. Eligibility boundaries will be set by yet-to-be-established National Strategy Advisory Councils. CAPA calls for a transparent, consultative subgoal-setting process with formal postgraduate representation.
• Allocation of the 1,000 places. CAPA seeks clarity on how places will be distributed across universities and disciplines, and how equity — including for First Nations candidates, regional students, and interdisciplinary researchers — will be guaranteed.
• A credible pathway to universal reform. A commitment without a timeline, mechanism, or funding is a values based aspiration. CAPA will continue its advocacy in the budget to ensure that postgraduate issues are funded.
• Accountability for freed-up RTP funding. CAPA calls for accountability mechanisms to ensure universities pass released institutional funding on to all PhD candidates, rather than absorbing it elsewhere.
“We want to know exactly how these projects will be decided. In the long term, we want to ensure that we don’t end up with a two-tiered PhD system where some students are living under the poverty line, whilst others are being supported properly,” said Mitch Craig, CAPA National Secretary.
“The most important thing is that we don’t end up with fewer scholarships, opportunities, for talented Australians to undertake research training. These recommendations need to be funded by the government, otherwise it will result in fewer scholarships and increased burden on universities.”
“It is critical that the government recognises that projects in the Humanities and Social Sciences can fit into the national priority areas, not just lab-based research,” said Richard Lee, CAPA National Vice President.
“In the long term, the national priorities need to adapt and expand. A strong research nation supports the full spectrum of disciplines as innovation doesn’t come from one discipline alone – it comes from the interaction between science, technology, the humanities and the social sciences.”
“We will keep working until every PhD candidate in Australia receives a stipend that respects their contribution, meets their basic needs, and reflects the value of the knowledge they are creating. Priority area premiums are a win — but a postgraduate in any field deserves to eat, pay rent, and focus on their research without financial anxiety,” said Jesse Gardner-Russell, CAPA National President.
CAPA will write to relevant Ministers seeking answers to the questions above and will engage directly with the National Innovation Council design process. CAPA thanks its affiliated member organisations, partner bodies, and the thousands of postgraduate students whose sustained advocacy has made this moment possible.
—ENDS—
About CAPA
The Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations (CAPA) is the national peak body representing the interests of postgraduate students at Australian universities. CAPA advocates for over 570,000 postgraduate students on matters including research funding, stipend adequacy, academic integrity, and student welfare. CAPA’s research and policy work is produced in partnership with its 29 affiliated university and campus-based postgraduate associations and in close collaboration with the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Postgraduate Association (NATSIPA).
For Comment
Jesse Gardner-Russell National President President@capa.edu.au | Charlotte Backshall Media and Communications Officer media@capa.edu.au |
