Labor’s First Move: Writing Off Student Debt. With Your Money. July 2025

So, Mr Albanese and Labor have been returned to Government with an increased majority. (Somehow they increased that majority with a primary vote of less than 35%. Go figure). The opposition coalition, primarily the Liberal party, were hopeless during the campaigning. But that's another article for another day.
The first order of business for the returned Albanese government was to wipe 20% off some students’ HELP (Higher Education Loan Program) debts. Mr Albanese was very pleased with himself on social media and pitched the initiative as "fair" - some relief after years of high indexation and cost-of-living pressures.
I saw the post on FaceBook, and I’ve thought about it for a while. I’ve thought about my own kids. And honestly? It's made me a bit cranky. I’m not angry at the students. They signed up to study, took on a debt, and now they've been told they won’t have to pay all of it back. I don’t blame them one bit for taking the win. Most of them are just doing their best to get ahead in a world that’s gotten harder to navigate.
But here’s my question — and it seems like I'm the only one quietly pondering the same thing: What does this mean for everyone else?
I never went to university. I got a job at 17 which released me from year 11, which I was not doing well at. Plenty of others I know did the same. Some stayed on their farm, gained a trade apprenticeship, or started with a basic job. Some of my friends never had the chance to study. Some were like me and just weren’t wired that way. Some didn't know what direction their studies should take. And some didn't like the idea of owing money for their studies.
And now, we’re all being forced to help pay off someone else’s loan. When you boil this policy down, that’s what it is.
We, the taxpayers, already help students. Universities get billions of dollars in "public funding" (your money and mine) every year before a single student pays a cent in fees. Then we loan those students more money through HELP. And now, we’re scrubbing 20% of that loan off the books too?
All of this while we are already have massive national debt, something like $850 billion. That's equivalent to around $56,000 per taxpayer.
What really frustrates me, though, is the bigger picture. Australia in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis, national debt is approaching a trillion dollars, (a TRILLION dollars!!) and dark clouds are gathering to the nation's north. Yet the Albanese government continues to spend like there's no tomorrow. Instead of tightening the belt, prioritising essentials, and charting a path back to surplus, they’re dishing out feel-good policies that sound generous but come at a real cost. We need leadership that takes debt seriously, not governments that buy applause with borrowed money.There’s no stash of cash set aside to bail us out. What we are doing by forgiving 20% of HELP debt is borrowing money to forgive someone else’s borrowed money.
I’m trying to imagine what would happen if I suggested to the bank that they forgive 20% of my mortgage by adding to everyone else's mortgage. I don't think that they would be willing to do it. Because in the real world, you pay your own debts.
I’ve heard the argument that this is no different from Medicare — a shared system, where we all chip in for the good of everyone. But I think that Medicare is quite different. Medicare is universal. Everyone gets sick. Everyone needs care eventually. Whether you’re a tradie or a farmer or a practicing surgeon, we all benefit from that system.
But HELP debt is different. A help debt is a personal debt. It’s a loan taken on by choice. It may open doors for sure, but only for some. It’s not a service that all of us will (or could) use. And now the rest of us are footing the bill.
And to be clear, I'm not bitter about this. And it’s not about tearing down anyone who has studied. Like I said, my son has a HELP debt. I want him to succeed. I want his generation to have opportunities, not obstacles.
But I also want fairness.
If a tradie works four years on apprentice wages, pays taxes from the day they start, and builds their skills on-site instead of in a lecture hall, why should they now help pay off someone else’s HECS? They have no choice, after all, where their tax goes.
Mr Albanese says this is about fairness. But it doesn’t feel fair to this bloke who left school and started work. Or to a couple who may have never took a loan, or ever drew a dole payment, but now see their taxes go to pay off someone else’s loan when the nation is already suffering from crippling and inflationary debt.
Fairness can’t just mean helping the people with degrees. It has to mean respecting other's paths too.