International education is “not the main game”. That was the message delivered by the Minister for Education, Jason Clare, about Australia’s fourth largest, $51bn, export industry. Speaking at the Universities Australia Solutions Summit 2025 gala dinner on Tuesday night, Clare gave short shrift in his speech to the international education sector.
The little attention that he did pay continued a pattern that we have come to expect from the Minister, with the crux of the message ‘you should be grateful that we don’t make it any worse’ and ‘the other guys would be so much worse’.
On Tuesday night universities were being told that they should be grateful the Government proposed a cap on international students, rather than adopting the Australian Universities Accord recommendation that “universities would have to chip into based on the revenue they make”.
(For those who can’t immediately recall every Accord recommendation, Clare was referring to the recommended Higher Education Future Fund, which would provide “support for the built and digital infrastructure, including student housing, that will be needed to cope with projected future enrolment growth”).
He also took the opportunity to have a go at the Liberal Party’s decision not to support what he characterised as “caps” (rather than of the ESOS Amendment Bill, which is more accurate) and while not naming Ministerial Direction 111, he said it was “better and fairer” than Ministerial Direction 107.
He concluded by acknowledging that the space is contentious and that international education revenue is important, but “it is not the main game”.
Opposition Address – eye watering revenues which are not sustainable
In her Opposition’s Address the following morning (Wednesday), Liberal Senator Sarah Henderson spent more time on the international education sector, than Clare. But the message was far from positive, as she channelled ‘the other guy is so much worse’, giving some real insight into what the election campaign, and a Coalition Government, will look like.
Henderson reciprocated Clare’s criticism, taking aim at the current Government’s opening of “the floodgates to record levels of international students, fuelling the housing crisis”. She also went on to say that the “uncontrolled surge” was an “immigration mess”, due to Labor’s ‘Big Australia’ policy.
Some of the messaging that we saw throughout 2024 got another run: the Group of Eight’s “rivers of gold”; the impact of international students on “the education outcomes of Australian students”; regional universities impacted by Ministerial Direction’s 107 and 111.
“For too long, universities have relied on a business model which yielded them eye watering revenues which are not sustainable or in line with expectations of the Australian community”, she said.
In what could be seen as a throwaway line, but may also be something to watch, she also criticised the number of international students in postgraduate courses.
Henderson also repeated the announcement made by Leader of the Opposition, Peter Dutton, that a tougher student cap than Labor’s proposal will be put into place if elected, “focused on excessive numbers of foreign students in metropolitan cities, particularly Melbourne and Sydney where two thirds of foreign students live and study”.
In what I’m sure was intended to provide a level of comfort, Henderson reassured the audience, “but our approach will ensure you have long term certainty, underpinned with proper consultation, with special consideration for the regions where foreign students are integral to local economies”.
There was some ‘reassurance’ from Henderson, that the sector would have “long term certainty, underpinned with proper consultation” (long term certainty isn’t great if the news is bad… and consultation is only real if feedback is taken on board). It also appears that regional universities will be well looked after.
Something else that piqued my interest in the speech was the interchangeability between ‘international’ and ‘foreign’ students. ‘Foreign’ (not even the oft-used ‘overseas’) has the connotation that there’s something wrong, different, suspicious. Henderson used ‘foreign students’ five times and ‘international students’ six times.
Maybe it’s nothing, but when using it in the context of “excessive numbers of foreign students in metropolitan cities” and “the proportion of foreign students is frequently much higher in postgraduate courses”, I can’t help but think how this plays out in the electorate during the upcoming campaign.
Universities Australia CEO National Press Club address
Speaking at the National Press Club yesterday, Luke Sheehy, Universities Australia’s Chief Executive Officer, criticised the politicisation of the international education sector. He told the audience, “International education should be above politics,” and described it as a “very bitter pill to swallow” to hear that the sector is “worth less than a few votes at the ballot box”.
Sheehy called for support of a university sector that is “being asked to educate a million more students each year by 2050…a critical national imperative to ensure our economy grows and Australia prospers”.
He said it was “crazy to even think about curtailing” an industry that supports jobs, funds research, and subsidises the education of Australian students.
In his address, Sheehy also highlighted the contribution that international students make to the Australian community and workforce. “And they strengthen Australia’s cultural fabric and links to the outside world,” he said.
“In a federal election year, it’s high time the major parties came to the table,” he said. A call to action that would be shared across Australia’s international education sector, although sadly there was no evidence of this in either Party’s speech.
You can read the Minister’s full speech here.
Luke Sheehy’s speech is available here.
