Higher Education Support Amendment (Streamlining and Other Measures) Bill 2012
Information about the Inquiry
On 11 October 2012 the Senate referred the Higher Education Support Amendment (Streamlining and Other Measures) Bill 2012 for inquiry and report.
The Bill would amend the operation of the Higher Education Loan Program (HELP) scheme, in particular the VET FEE-HELP scheme, by
- implementing a risk managed approach to provider approvals and administrative compliance, including consideration of reports by the national education regulators;
- implementing more effective suspension and revocation actions;
- simplifying the guidelines around VET FEE-HELP;
- improving the flexibility of the census date requirement;
- providing enabling legislation for specified certificate IV level qualifications to be eligible for VET FEE-HELP; and
- improving Ministerial and Secretarial delegation arrangements.
Submissions should be received by 25 October 2012. The reporting date is 19 November 2012.
The Committee is seeking written submissions from interested individuals and organisations preferably in electronic form submitted online or sent by email to eewr.sen@aph.gov.au as an attached Adobe PDF or MS Word format document. The email must include full postal address and contact details.
Alternatively, written submissions may be sent to:
Committee Secretary
Senate Education, Employment and Workplace Relations Committees
PO Box 6100
Parliament House
Canberra ACT 2600
Australia
Notes to help you prepare your submission are available from the website at https://www.aph.gov.au/senate/committee/wit_sub/index.htm. Alternatively, the Committee Secretariat will be able to help you with your inquiries and can be contacted on telephone +61 2 6277 3521 or facsimile +61 2 6277 5706 or by email to eewr.sen@aph.gov.au.
Inquiries from hearing and speech impaired people should be directed to Parliament House TTY number 02 6277 7799. Adobe also provides tools at http://access.adobe.com/ for the blind and visually impaired to access PDF documents. If you require any special arrangements to enable you to participate in the Committee's inquiry, please contact the Committee Secretariat.
Once the Committee accepts your submission, it becomes a confidential Committee document and is protected by Parliamentary Privilege. You must not release your submission without the Committee's permission. If you do, it will not be protected by Parliamentary Privilege. At some stage during the inquiry, the Committee normally makes submissions public and places them on its website. Please indicate if you want your submission to be kept confidential.
For further information, contact: Committee Secretary
Senate Education, Employment and Workplace Relations Committees
PO Box 6100
Parliament House
Canberra ACT 2600
Australia