Attachment B
Explanatory Statement for the Amendment No. 4 to the Other Grants Guidelines 2006
Guidelines issued under section 238-10 of the Higher Education Support Act 2003
Higher Education Support Act 2003 – Amendment No. 4 to the Other Grants Guidelines 2006
Issued by the authority of the Minister for Education, Science and Training
Subject:- Higher Education Support Act 2003 – Amendment No. 4 to the Other Grants Guidelines 2006
Authority
Section 238-10 of the Higher Education Support Act 2003 (the Act) provides that the Minister may make guidelines providing for matters required or permitted by the Act necessary or convenient to be provided in order to carry out or give effect to the Act. In particular, section 238-10 specifies that the Minister may make Other Grants Guidelines to give effect to matters set out in Part 2-3 of the Act.
Section 41-15 of the Act provides that the Other Grants Guidelines may specify one or more programmes under which grants for particular purposes specified in the table in subsection
41-10(1) are to be paid.
Purpose and operation
These Guidelines amend the Higher Education Support Act 2003 - Other Grants Guidelines 2006 (Other Grants Guidelines 2006) registered on 22 November 2006 (see F2006L03785) and which commenced on 23 November 2006. The purpose of these Guidelines is to amend the Other Grants Guidelines 2006 for the fourth time.
The Other Grants Guidelines 2006 have eleven chapters, each representing a purpose for which grants may be made under Part 2-3 of the Act.
The purpose of this amendment is to alter Chapter 10 of the Other Grants Guidelines 2006 to reflect the inclusion of the Implementation Assistance Programme and the Australian Scheme for Higher Education Repositories and remove the Systemic Infrastructure Initiative, which terminated in 2006.
Detail of the Amendments
Chapter 10 Grants to support the development of systemic infrastructure used by higher education providers
Chapter 10 specifies the Implementation Assistance Programme and the Australian Scheme for Higher Education Repositories as programmes to provide funding to universities (Table A providers) and specified bodies corporate for systemic research infrastructure in accordance with subsection 41-15(1) of the Act.
Subsection 41-10(1) of the Act specifies the bodies corporate that are specified in the Other Grants Guidelines which are eligible for grants to support the development of systemic infrastructure used by higher education providers.
The Implementation Assistance Programme is a non-ongoing programme that will finish at the end of 2010.
The Australian Scheme for Higher Education Repositories is a non-ongoing programme that will finish at the end of 2009.
Consultation
The draft Administrative Information for the Implementation Assistance Programme and the Australian Scheme for Higher Education Repositories were released for consultation to all higher education providers (specified at 10.10.1 of the Other Grants Guidelines) eligible to participate in the Research Quality Framework on 29 June 2007. The Administrative Information supplements chapter 10 of the Other Grants Guidelines and sets out the conditions of support under the Implementation Assistance Programme and the Australian Scheme for Higher Education Repositories. No changes were made as a result of this consultation because the Department received positive feedback. The Amendment to the Other Grants Guidelines was not released for consultation, as it does not specify the process of allocating support under the two programmes and only specifies the two programmes and lists those bodies that are eligible.
Commencement
The guidelines will commence on the day after the day on which they are registered on the Federal Register of Legislative Instruments.