A national survey conducted last year by the University of Melbourne's Centre for the Study of Higher Education for the Australia Vice-Chancellors' Committee (AVCC) has revealed that most of Australia's 700,000 university students have become financially worse off over the past five years.
The results of the survey were released by the AVCC on March 8. It found that 70.6% of full-time undergraduate students worked during semester and that "one in eight students — 12.8 per cent — indicated they regularly went without food or other necessities because they could not afford them".
Of those students who worked during semester, most worked for more than 14 hours a week, and 40% found that working had a negative impact on their ability to study.
A March 9 National Union of Students media release noted that in "the UWA Student Guild's 2006 Student Poverty Survey, it was revealed that 61% of students surveyed found that student income support, in the form of Centrelink entitlements, were inadequate to survive on a day-to-day basis".
The AVCC report noted that 52.5% of students "indicated they often worried about their finances", and that, among the Indigenous students surveyed, "72.5 per cent reported their financial situation was often a source of worry for them".
In addition to the large HECS debts that students leave university with, the report found that almost a quarter
of undergraduate students incur more debts of around $4700 to fund their studies.
The report found that "the criteria for eligibility for Austudy and the Youth Allowance received criticism from many students", with many expressing the view that the "amount of income support was insufficient in meeting fundamental living costs".
Australia Associated Press reported on March 9 that federal education minister Julie Bishop, who receives a ministerial salary and annual allowances of at least $230,000, responded to the results of the AVCC survey by saying students "should be more frugal".