Universities Australia’s annual Pitch it clever competition is now open for early-career researchers to share their brightest ideas with the nation.

Data released today confirms the critical role universities play in ensuring Australia continues to benefit from our world class research system.

Australia’s economy could be $24 billion bigger over 10 years if investment in higher education research and development was lifted by just one per cent, according to Universities Australia’s submission to the Productivity Commission.

Last month Josh Frydenberg released the  2021 Intergenerational report (IGR). A legacy of former Treasurer Peter Costello, the five-yearly IGR analyses “the long-term sustainability of current policies and how demographic, technological and other structural trends may affect the economy and the budget over the next 40 years.” In short, what Governments decide now matters well beyond the three-year federal electoral cycle. 

Thursday will see the first major meeting of the university sector and its leadership since COVID-19 closed Australia’s international borders and upended the lives of staff, students and their communities.

More than 30 years ago, Keith Lurie, an American researcher in the field of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR), heard a strange story. One of his patients had suffered an apparent heart attack while at home. The strange part was he was revived by his son using, of all things, a toilet plunger to compress his father’s chest.

Topics: HELP Loan, importance of university education

Topics: universities’ contribution to national productivity; meeting the demand for university places in the future

Topics: universities’ contribution to national productivity; meeting the demand for university places in the future

Catriona Jackson, Chief Executive, Universities Australia.

Address to the National Press Club by Universities Australia Chair, Professor Deborah Terry.

Thank you for inviting us to provide evidence today. I would like to note three things briefly to assist the committee.