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<\/p>\nA split is emerging within Coalition ranks over the future of Australia\u2019s universities after Nationals Senator Bridget McKenzie declared the only way to fix higher education was to \u201cbreak it\u201d.<\/p>\n
Senator McKenzie accused universities of indoctrinating students and entrenching a left-wing world view among future judges, politicians, teachers and other decision-makers during a speech to the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship conference in London.<\/p>\n
She said the higher education sector had become so resistant to change that its institutions might no longer be worth preserving.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy firm belief now is that the only way to fix higher education is to break it,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Senator McKenzie was a lecturer in education before entering parliament.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
She\u2019s suggesting student teachers are being immersed in ideas of \u201cwhite guilt, victimhood, climate catastrophism or even antisemitism\u201d, which she argues is being carried into classrooms.<\/p>\n
Her intervention is exposing differing views within the Coalition over how far the opposition should go in confronting universities over ideology and campus culture.<\/p>\n
Nationals leader Matt Canavan is echoing concerns about ideological activism on campus but stopped short of backing McKenzie\u2019s call for drastic intervention.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t have particular plans to penalise universities,\u201d Canavan said, suggesting McKenzie\u2019s comments did not reflect a settled opposition policy.<\/p>\n
Senator Canavan argues not enough has been done to protect free speech and ensure students were able to go about their studies without intimidation.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am concerned about some of the ideological perspectives that are both being taught at universities, but even worse, some that are being allowed to continue without any restraint,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Senator Canavan said there \u201cwere some very extreme views expressed on university campuses\u201d after the October 7, 2023 terror attacks in Israel, and \u201cthere were attempts to prevent other students from going about their business\u201d.<\/p>\n
Independent ACT senator David Pocock is criticising Senator McKenzie\u2019s approach, saying that it seeks to influence what is taught within higher education institutions.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m really wary of the sort of Trumpian reach into universities where politicians, governments, start telling universities what they can and can\u2019t teach,\u201d Mr Pocock said.<\/p>\n
He also asked why Senator McKenzie had made the comments from overseas while parliament was sitting in Canberra.<\/p>\n
Politicians and leading conservative thinkers are speaking at the ARC conference in London this week.<\/p>\n
Around 4,000 people from more than 85 countries are expected to attend the annual summit of the organisation co-founded by Jordan Peterson.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019ve got to explain that to their constituents, the people that send them here to Canberra to debate really important things and to ensure that one, they\u2019re advocating for their state and territory in the senate and ultimately voting on their behalf,\u201d Mr Pocock said.<\/p>\n
The independent senator argues he has different priorities.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy focus has been on how do we ensure that universities have the right governance structures so they can actually get on with the research, with the teaching that Australians want and that we need for the future,\u201d Mr Pocock said.<\/p>\n
The exchange underscores a broader political argument over the role of universities.<\/p>\n
Conservatives are increasingly accusing campuses of being sites of ideological activism, while progressives warn against political interference.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A split is emerging within Coalition ranks over the future of Australia\u2019s universities after Nationals Senator Bridget McKenzie…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":757103,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,27305,44],"class_list":["post-757102","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-coalition","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/757102","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=757102"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/757102\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/757103"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=757102"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=757102"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=757102"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}