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University academics in Australia now earn 44 per cent more than their New Zealand counterparts and the gap is growing, an academic group here says.
New Zealand Vice-Chancellors Committee chairman Roger Field said this week's Australian federal Budget had benefited universities there and was turning the pay gap into a "chasm".
"The Association of Commonwealth Universities' latest salary survey report notes the particular risk that strong Australian academic salaries pose to New Zealand,"Professor Field said.
"At present, academics working in Australian universities receive salaries which are 44 per cent higher than salaries paid to their counterparts here, on an across-the-board basis."
He said the gap was further accentuated by salary loadings and non-salary benefits paid by Australian universities, such as employer contributions to superannuation.
Professor Field said Australian universities now had access to the new A$11 billion ($13.64 billion) Education Investment Fund and an A$500 million Better Universities Renewal Fund, while the total New Zealand tertiary education budget amounted to around $4.4 billion, 42 per cent of which was spent on student financial support.
He said the Australian Government appeared to be listening to the Universities Australia collective, while successive Governments in New Zealand had run the university system down.
The decline in total funding was costing universities $230 million a year in real terms, compared with 15 years ago, he said.
Tertiary Education Minister Pete Hodgson said that in the 15 years to 2006, funding for universities had increased by 87 per cent and assertions from the Vice-Chancellors Committee that funding was in decline were "unfortunate".
Mr Hodgson said the Government acknowledged the gap between New Zealand and Australian academic salaries, but that had been the case for decades.
"In recent times that gap has actually narrowed, though only slightly."
- NZPA
