More TAFE students hit by a bungled education loans scheme are predicted to come forward reporting their debts.
The Morrison government introduced legislation on Thursday aiming to support people who were impacted by the previous VET FEE-HELP program.
Jobs and Industrial Relations Minister Kelly O'Dwyer shared the story of Gabrielle, a young woman who ended up with a $20,000 VET FEE-HELP debt despite asking the training provider to withdraw her from the course.
Gabrielle had been convinced the course would be free and was offered a new laptop, before her two attempts to withdraw from the college were ignored.
Ms O'Dwyer told the lower house the legislation would help students "who were ripped off" to have their debts cancelled.
Labor's former scheme, introduced in 2012, was axed by the government in 2016 and has been replaced by a tighter regulated loans program.
Vocational Education Minister Michaelia Cash said while an exact figure of people impacted is not known, further cases could come to light.
"It is very difficult to tell because often these students were signed up and weren't even told they were incurring a debt," Senator Cash said on Thursday.
"But the ombudsman has been receiving complaints and we believe that around 2500 students to date have claims totalling around $50 million."
Under the former scheme, private vocational colleges had access to government subsidies for every student enrolled.
Dodgy providers took advantage of that by advertising courses that delivered poor educational results and left students out of pocket.
According to government figures, the scheme cost taxpayers more than $7.5 billion.
Senator Cash is confident that shonky businesses have no way of bursting back in and the new scheme has the backing of the sector.
"All of the dodgy providers are now gone because we literally shut down the cash cow that Labor had introduced for them," she said.
"This program saddled (students) with debt and offered very little in return, sometimes a worthless qualification - if anything at all."
