To the Honourable the Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives in Parliament assembled. The humble petition of the undersigned citizens of Australia respectfully showeth:

That we are opposed to any moves to cut funding to universities. We believe that further reductions in university funding would have a serious impact on the quality of higher education, and on access to university study for the Australian community. We emphasise that higher education has already absorbed substantial cuts in real funding levels over the last decade and that further reductions are unsustainable.

Furthermore, we believe that the principle of democratic access to higher education requires that undergraduate study should be provided free of up-front tuition fees. We believe that any move to allow universities to charge up-front undergraduate fees would fundamentally threaten this basic right.

Finally, we call on the Federal Government to provide supplementation through university operating grants so that university staff are adequately remunerated. We believe that the quality of higher education provided by universities is dependent in large part upon their ability to attract and retain appropriately qualified, skilled and experienced staff.

Your petitioners therefore humbly pray that you will not cut university funding levels, nor increase HECS, nor allow universities to charge up-front fees to undergraduate students. Universities must also be funded at levels which provide adequate remuneration for their staff.

And your petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray.