[Muanet] Has this parallels in Australia?

[Dion Giles]

Seems that this may bear on both GATS and AUSFTA -- Dion Giles
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Just another tradeable service

Carol Goar, Toronto Star July 5 1004

http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1088806209072&call_pageid=970599109774&col=Columnist969907622164

Ken Kehl returned to university at 35 years of age after a somewhat aimless 
career in insurance and car repairs. He planned to get a master's degree in 
education, researching a nice light topic such as the importance of 
mentorship in students' lives.

Instead, the Hamilton native became ensnarled in one of the most urgent and 
controversial debates in the academic community. He has just submitted a 
weighty thesis warning that higher education could be a casualty of the 
current round of global trade talks.

He fears that universities such as Brock, which he attends, will be 
transformed into profit-making diploma mills, competing fiercely with 
foreign-controlled institutions.

Kehl has grounds for concern. On Jan. 1, 2005, the General Agreement on 
Trade in Services (GATS), one of the deals worked out by the World Trade 
Organization, takes effect. It defines education as a tradeable commodity, 
subject to the same rules as other commercial services.

That means Canada must allow foreign providers the same access to its 
education market as domestic universities. It means governments cannot use 
subsidies or tax breaks to put Canadian universities at an advantage. It 
means education will become a deregulated global business.

"What frightens me is the possibility that learning will become just 
another marketable skill," Kehl said in an interview. "The pursuit of 
knowledge, academic curiosity and the human element of teaching and 
learning will all be compromised.

"It's already happening," he conceded, "but this would legislate it and 
make it irreversible."

[snip]

The agreement itself exempts "services supplied in the exercise of 
government authority." But Canada has not made the case that its 
post-secondary education system is funded and administered chiefly by 
government.

A concerted public effort to get education off the bargaining table in 
Geneva might make a difference. But there's no sign of that happening.

Two years ago when he started his MA degree, Kehl never imagined himself 
becoming an advocate for public education in a mercantile world. But now 
that the role has found him, he feels compelled to play it passionately.