I'm really enjoying this thread...
Ok RStuart - HECS is interesting. If the Govt imposed and collected a Uni amenities fee which they handed back to Unis I suspect it would be more palatable for students and less palatable for non-students somehow. I wonder why? ;-)
"Education related expenses of the less-fortunate". I don't know what is covered by this. And were my 'education related expenses' included? I am hardly wealthy now and certainly wasn't when I was a student. I am not opposed to education expenses being paid for by the taxpayer as now (although I accept it I'm not a fan of HECS, not because it is partial user pays but because of the inherent injustice - those who implemented it never paid it and shifted debt onto those unable to vote) I am opposed to paying for that which I do not receive. That's hardly unique I would have thought.
No, I'm not opposed to a Student Union/Guild call it what you will - provided that those who wish to join it (and pay) can, and those who don't, needn't, without suffering penalty. Are any of the above extreme viewpoints?
Efficiency has a particular meaning. I suspect that students would just as happily provide services through a Uni run clinic as a Guild one (I know this from experience) but I'm surprised that free labour is an argument advanced by pro-SU people. I suspect mandatory SU distorts the efficiency of service provision (delinks income from demand) and politicising the decision-making does likewise. However, I'm still not sure about this one either way.
I am entirely in favour of assisting people to help themselves and see it as often (but not always) superior to Govt involvement. However, compulsion is not the way to do it. If the Guild can offer something the people want - they'll pay for it without compulsion.
Tell me, what is my political viewpoint?

Labor = tax and spend

Need I say more?

J S Mills: "those who implemented [HECS] never paid it and shifted debt onto those unable to vote"

True, but that is irrelevant as to whether it is good policy. I recall there was a large increase in the number of University places at the time, and HECS helped to fund the increase. I would hesitate to call the trade-off an injustice just because you are disadvantaged by it.

J S Mills: "I am opposed to paying for that which I do not receive."

Yet, you don't like HECS, which removed some of the burden of paying for tertiary education from people who never use it. As Spikey pointed out, you are an Australian - so get used to paying for things you don't use directly. You pay for the minding of downs syndrome kid, so can pay his mothers wages as a school teacher so you can pay for another kid to go to Uni and to learn how build a road you will pay for. The fact that most of us are happy to be part of this wondrous web is what makes us one of the most successful societies on the planet.

It would help considerably if you stopped looking for what you get out of it, and start looking at the bigger picture - at what is good for us as a society. So, you are whinging because you have to pay an additional 0.5% on what it costs to educate you at Uni. You know that 66 out of every 100 engineering students drop out? If providing help for books, accommodation, health, legal and providing social outlets gets just one of those through so he can build a road that fee has paid for itself 200 times over.

J S Mills: "compulsion is not the way to do it."

No? So tell, how do you propose to get the Students to give up their free time to help? Not the ones who, as you say, would do it regardless, but rather those who like to think they are running the show.

Rstuart - excuse me a moment while I envision the utopia you speak of where people care not for what they get but rather whether it is good for 'society'. Hang on, what is society, what is good for it, and who gets to decide what to do with my money to implement this wondrous scheme?
If your engineering student statistics are correct (of course, 87% of all statistics are made up. 82% of people know that) then maybe some of them weren't meant to be engineers. Maybe some of them became nurses or teachers. And if they had all stayed on we would be massively over-supplied with engineers and under-supplied with teachers and nurses (I actually know an engineering student who dropped out and became a nurse)!
If society values engineers so much, and if providing books/accomodation/health/legal and other support helps keep them, and if a student guild would provide those things, and if the engineers would access them (lots of maybes here, no?) then maybe society should provide the Guild's financial support. Why single out one group to pay for a society-wide benefit?
Then you turn from being interested in service provision to involving students who will only participate if its run by students? IMHO that number is likely smaller than those who were put off by the Guild running stuff. If the service is provided then surely you're satisfied, whether its provided by the Uni or the Guild?
Baygon - I actually used core and non-core in my post but had to edit for length. If I go to a Metallica concert I see the value in police presence and pay for it. If I go to Barry Manilow - not so much. I don't care who administers services - so long as I only have to pay for what I use. However, I accept that doesn't work with Government. My whole point is - do we extend the same power to Unis and, if so, who else gets such power?
Sorry Shadow Minister but the Howard Government's fiscal history is not helping your argument.

Right now I am not trying to convince you that any particular thing is good for society. What triggered this rant was your words "because of the inherent injustice", and later "provided that those who wish to join it (and pay) can, and those who don't, needn't.". They aren't the words of someone who is saying "well, I already get 80% of my Uni education expenses paid for, but if I pay 80.5% and another 1% get through then that is good". They are the words of someone looks at the proposal and asks themselves: "what is in it for me?".

J S Mills: "what is society, what is good for it, and who gets to decide what to do with my money to implement this wondrous scheme?"

The answers are respectively: "you decide", "you decide" and "you". Right now it looks to me like you haven't thought about the answers, because you are thinking in terms of what is good for "J S Mills", thus you have no need for them. To put it bluntly, I and the rest of Australian don't give a rats what is in it for "J S Mills". If you want to appeal to we, the people who funded your education you will have appeal to the interests we have in common. The major thing we have in common is the society we live in, as for it mostly determines how comfortably we all will live out our lives.

J S Mills: "If your engineering student statistics are correct"

They are the figures the Professors reeled off when I studied engineering at UQ, and the same figures were given to my son a couple of years ago when he did the same thing.

J S Mills: "massively over-supplied"

You aren't from an engineering background, are you? My son's cohort at UQ had 40 at his graduation ceremony. 40, in all branches of engineering. Not that I am complaining, it means he will do fairly well for himself in the next couple of decades. But you should be worried. 40 ain't near enough.

RStuart my friend, remember our comments about emotive language.
Thank you for the psycho-analysis - but I thought you were an engineer? My comments about HECS were simply that although I accepted it I thought it unfair that it was imposed on those who had no say by people who got their education for free. Does that make me self-centred and mercenary? I agree in broad terms that it is an acceptable form of partial-user pays but is largely subsidised by society because of the benefits to society of people with higher education. You see - I can think of society.
It sounds like you are claiming to speak for everyone. I am always uncomfortable when someone makes such a claim as it is never true and usually unhelpful. What I think you really mean is, 'if you want to convince ME then you must put it the way I want to hear it'. That's unlikely to happen as I don't know you and our positions seem opposed.
According to the President of the Institute of Engineers, 798 engineers graduate from WA alone annually across all disciplines. From just one state! I couldn't find the national figure but that number, extrapolated out, suggests that the 40 at UQ are hardly Robinson Crusoe.
But none of this really goes to the real point of my question - do we allow Unis to impose global fees for services not globally used and, if so, to whom else do we allow this power?