b'Canberra observed matters worse by arbitrarily excluding universities from the Job Keeper wage subsidy program (originally budgeted at $130B and meant to support 6 million jobs through the initial lockdowns). Universities were left on their own to deal with collapsing revenues, operational challenges (like online learning), and health restrictions.This report recommends an additional $3.75B per year (less than 1% of the annual Australian budget) until normal teaching can resume. Without this level of support, it is estimated it may not be possible to re-build the world class teaching and research tertiary system that we had before COVID.The main findings in the reportinclude:1. So far in 2021, tertiary education lost 40 000 jobs (almost one job in five). Universities suffered more job loss over the last 12 months than any Figure 2.Quarterly Mineral and petroleum investments 2005-2021, normalised to June 2021 $A. Noticeother non-agriculture sector in the that the onshore and offshore investments for petroleum exploration are now of similar size. Offshoreeconomy.exploration has come close to a halt. Source https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/industry/mining/mineral- 2. Most of those jobs (about 35 000) were and-petroleum-exploration-australia/latest-release. lost from public universities. More jobs were lost in TAFEs and other public What would we do without COVID- project located in east-centralvocational education institutions.free(so far) WA? A massive $594M wasSaskatchewan. It will be one of the3. Job losses are getting worse, not better. invested there in the June Quarter.worlds largest potash mines, producingAnd they now mostly affect permanent Queensland was second with $104M and8 Mt of marketable potash annuallyand full-time positions (unlike the the other states were also-rans. when it reaches full capacity. initial lockdowns, when casual workers Development of the mine will be carriedsuffered the largest job losses). The Petroleum pandemic is thus reinforcing the out over three phases, at an estimated Petroleum exploration is at the lowestcost of over $US12B. The mine willperverse trend of casualisation in levels since 2005. This is not surprisingoperate for an estimated life of moreuniversities.because, although the oil price has slowlythan 50 years. An interesting challenge4. Women have experienced climbed back to above $US70/bl therefor a new-look BHP. disproportionate job cutsmore than is still the ever more important issue oftheir share of total employment (25000 climate change to consider. v 16 000).Pandemic job losses in Higher5. Reduced staffing and increased The long-term future of petroleumEducation and their consequences casualisation will hurt the quality of must have played a part in the mergereducation and undermine the ability of Santos ($21B) and Oil Search ($8bn)I have mentioned previously the love/ of Australian universities to support and an even bigger merger betweenhate relationship between the presentnational economic recovery.Woodside and BHP. BHP shareholdersgovernment and universities. The6. The Commonwealth Government will own 48% of Woodside, which has aAustralia Institute has now produced acould prevent these job losses by market capital of $20B and the petroleumreport (commissioned by the Nationalproviding $3.75B in additional funding part of BHP is valued at $19B. WoodsideTertiary Education Union) analysing into universities per year until normal is now in the worlds top ten oil and gasmore detail the effects of COVID-19 onteaching and international education producers and the Santos/Oil Searchour tertiary institutions (Littleton andcan resume.group will slot into the top twenty. Stanford, 2021).ReferenceMeanwhile BHP has bought the JansenThe public health measures and potash mine in Canada for $A8B.the closure of Australias borders toLittleton E. and Stanford J., 2021. An According to Mining Technology (https:// international students created majoravoidable catastrophe: Pandemic job www.mining-technology.com/projects/ financial and operational challengeslosses in Higher Education and their jansen-potash/), the Jansen project isfor Australias universities. Theconsequences, Australia Institute, an underground potash developmentCommonwealth Government madeSeptember 2021.OCTOBER 2021 PREVIEW 34'