Voluntary Student Unionism - History in Australia

History in Australia

Compulsory student organisation membership was initially accepted as uncontentious by all political persuasions. By the 1970s, the overtly political nature of the Australian Union of Students, which ran a number of overtly progressive campaigns (for example, in support of the Palestine Liberation Organization), led to a significant conservative minority within that organisation to call for voluntary student organisation membership.

VSU advocates initially attempted to bring it about by running campus referendum campaigns calling for voluntary membership. Such campaigns, however, were consistently defeated. Nevertheless, a campaign was successfully run to have many student organisations disaffiliate themselves from AUS, causing its eventual collapse.

NUS was formed as the successor of the AUS in the late 1980s. The ALSF then changed to focusing on lobbying state and federal Liberal Party governments to abolish compulsory membership. A case concerning James Cook University was brought to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, claiming that compulsory union membership was anti-competitive. The Commission eventually rejected the case on the basis that student organisations had a positive social impact. In Western Australia, VSU was partially enacted by the state Liberal Party government, only to be rescinded when the ALP regained power.

Following its election in 1996, the Howard Government signalled its intention to introduce VSU. It tried to pass legislation to this effect several times in the late 1990s. Student organisations responded with strong campaigns in opposition to VSU throughout that time. The legislation was persistently rejected in the Australian Senate, where the Labor Party, the Australian Democrats, and the Greens have voted against it. Following its 2001 election victory, aware that attempts to introduce VSU would not pass the Senate, the Government moved away from the VSU agenda. Advocates of VSU received a boost, however, when the Howard government gained control of the Senate at the 2004 Federal election. Nationwide implementation of VSU had been listed among the government's legislative agenda to be placed before the Senate.

On 16 March 2005, Brendan Nelson introduced the Higher Education Support Amendment (Abolition of Compulsory Up-front Student Union Fees) Bill 2005 before the Parliament. Initially expected to be passed due to the government's majority in the Senate from July, it was opposed in its original form by maverick senator Barnaby Joyce, who threatened to cross the floor if sporting facilities and collegial spirit were not protected. Despite such opposition, Education Minister Nelson insisted that the legislation would pass unamended and come into force as of 1 January 2006. By October 2005, however, it became apparent that it would not be possible to implement VSU in time for the new academic year.

On 9 December 2005, the legislation was reintroduced. Due to the decision of Joyce to cross the floor and vote against the legislation, Howard was forced to obtain the vote of Family First Senator Steve Fielding, who had maintained for several months that he was opposed to the bill in its current form. However, after being courted by Howard, Fielding did an abrupt about-face and voted for the legislation, calling compulsory student unionism "crazy" and allowing the bill to pass; though both Fielding and Brendan Nelson insisted no behind-the-scenes deal had secured his vote. The legislation was essentially identical to the government's original proposal, except that it was to come into effect on 1 July 2006, rather than at the start of the year. Fielding's office was vandalised the following weekend, with Fielding saying it was the work of opponents of VSU.

In September 2010 the Gillard Labor government introduced legislation to allow universities to charge students a compulsory service fee of up to $250 a year to fund amenities such as sporting facilities, childcare and counselling. The legislation passed after the Greens took the balance of power in the senate.