A new Commonwealth Prac Payment will provide students with $319.50 a week when they are on clinical and professional placements.
The payment will be means tested and start from July 1 next year, which will be after the next election. Those eligible will include people studying teaching, nursing, midwifery and social work. No cost for the measure was immediately available – the government said that would be in next week’s budget
The money is to help students who often have to give up work to undertake their placements and so are left out of pocket. The government’s Universities Accord report recommended the issue should be addressed, as did the Women’s Economic Equality Taskforce.
Education Minister Jason Clare at the weekend announced a rejig of the indexation arrangements for HELP and related student loans, which will benefit three million people, wiping out some $3 billion in debt.
As well as advancing the Accord agenda, the spending has an eye to the youth vote.
The government says the new Prac Payment will assist about 68,000 eligible higher education students and more than 5,000 VET students each year. The payment is benchmarked to the single Austudy rate.
The payment will be in addition to other income support a student might receive.
Placements are particularly a feature of feminised areas of study and work, and the government is also linking the measure to its gender equality strategy, Working for Women.
Authors: Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra
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