Draft Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency Legislation Released for Comment. (February 24, 2011)

The Minister for Tertiary Education, Skills, Jobs and Workplace Relations, Senator Chris Evans has today  released for public comment the draft of legislation establishing the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (TEQSA). In doing so the minister said that: "it is important that it be subjected to scrutiny and debate. As the higher education sector goes through a period of expansion, it is important for Australia to have a national system of regulation to assure the quality of all providers. A national approach is vital so that all students, domestic and international, can be assured of the quality of their education."

The government is "selling" the legislation on the basis that: "TEQSA will combine the regulatory activity currently undertaken in the states and territories with the quality assurance activities currently undertaken by the Australian Universities Quality Agency (AUQA). In so doing, it will reduce the number of federal, state and territory regulatory and quality assurance bodies from nine to one."

How willingly the states will cede their current regulatory authority to the federal government is a moot point.

The draft legislation is available at www.deewr.gov.au/teqsa.

With the closing of consultations the Government will introduce the TEQSA legislation to the Parliament in the week commencing 21 March 2011 and will also refer the TEQSA legislation to the Senate Committee on Education, Employment and Workplace Relations for inquiry.

The closing date for submissions on the draft is Thursday 10 March, 2011.