Stephen Jones and Sharon Bird, the federal members for Whitlam and Cunningham respectively, are calling on the Senate to reject the Job-Ready Graduate Package bill, they say will "saddle university students with a massive debt they will never be able to pay off".
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The Federal Government's proposed sweeping changes to higher education funding have already been debated in the House of Representatives.
The Labor politicians dropped by the University of Wollongong on Monday to support UOW's branch of the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) launch a petition against the proposed bill.
Federal Education Minister Dan Tehan wants to reduce fees for university courses in health, teaching and science but increase the fee cost of popular humanities, law and commerce degrees.
"The amendments in this bill demonstrate the government's commitment to ensuring university graduates have the job-ready skills and experience to be competitive in a challenging labour market," he told parliament on August 26.
National Party members within the Coalition government have also expressed their concern about the bill which also wants to cut government subsidies and loans from university students who fail half their subjects in their first year.
On Monday Whitlam MP Mr Jones said that the bill was "fatally flawed' and the government needed to go back to the drawing board.
"At a time when youth unemployment is going through the roof, when wages are flatlining, it seems the government's plan for young Australians is more university debt," he said.
"The plan doesn't make sense, especially when some of the occupations that are in the highest demand are going to have the highest fees. And some of the university degrees which provide the lowest post graduation wages are going to have the highest fees and the highest debt.
"This is a terrible plan that is going to be bad for students, bad for universities and bad for the region."
Cunningham MP Ms Bird said regional students and universities will be hit the hardest.
"Under the package it is estimated that nearly twice as many regional students will have to pay the highest rate of student fees," she said.
"This is really just another cut to the universities. Universities like our own one here, are going to be at the forefront of those cuts."
NTEU acting UOW branch president Rodney Vickers said the plan would see students pay more but universities still get less funding overall.
"It doesn't make any sense. We are trying to get students to do more STEM subjects but actually [the plan] pays the university less to do that STEM so we can't support those students as well as we might have before," Mr Vickers said.
"It actually incentivizes the university to take more arts students because we get more money for them...so the idea is students pay more but the university gets less overall."
When the Job-Ready Graduate Package was proposed back in June, UOW Vice-Chancellor Paul Wellings welcomed the proposed higher education reforms.
"These reforms will support us to strengthen our focus on domestic students, and enhance the mutually beneficial relationships we have with business and government," Professor Wellings said.
Mr Vickers argued this simple vocational approach to education was short-sighted.
"Narrowing students choices does not help society," he said.
"The changes forced on the sector will do that. It is short term versus long term.
"Vocational training is great and will get people into jobs in the short term but it is not good for the long term benefits of society.
"We need that fundamental research, that fundamental love of their discipline that will enable students and society to change for the future and change for the better."
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Agron Latifi
Wollongong born and bred. I love reporting about the Illawarra region and have been doing it for more than 20 years. I've moved into sport recently after covering the education round for the last five plus years for the Illawarra Mercury. It's been a great pleasure.
Wollongong born and bred. I love reporting about the Illawarra region and have been doing it for more than 20 years. I've moved into sport recently after covering the education round for the last five plus years for the Illawarra Mercury. It's been a great pleasure.
