The funding future of Australian universities remains in limbo, with Education Minister Simon Birmingham refusing to be drawn on where cuts might be found.
The government's proposed overhaul of higher education funding, which includes higher course fees and lower income thresholds for repayment of student loans, is stuck in the Senate where they face almost certain defeat.
"Don't try to fly flags that aren't there," Senator Birmingham told Labor senator Deborah O'Neill, who quizzed him during an estimates hearing in Canberra on Thursday.
"I'm not going to play rule-in, rule-out all day on hypotheticals."
The government will have to split its legislation into elements that can find support or create savings in areas that don't require parliament's approval.
Senator O'Neill described the government's failure to win over the Senate as "a victory for common sense in Australia's best interests".
Earlier, Labor colleague Jacinta Collins raised concerns about what she called "data integrity" issues.
She said the government had been misleading in pitching a reduction in unpaid student debt as a funding increase.
The government claims it would reduce debt not expected to be repaid by $2.2 billion as a result of their reforms.
"Minister, it's spin. It's not an accurate or fair representation of the shifts in funding in this package," Senator Collins said.
Framing debt reduction as funding increases was not how the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development would characterise it, she said.
"I think there is a data integrity issue for the department if we continue to let things be represented that way."
But Senator Birmingham said the totality of funding streams to universities would result in funding growth - and that taxpayers did care about reducing debt.
"For taxpayers, that's the prime concern," he said.
