Universities Accord (Student Support and Other Measures) Bill 2024

The majority voted against an amendment introduced by Victorian Senator Sarah Henderson (Liberal), which means it failed.

Senator Henderson explained that:

This concerns the Commonwealth prac payment. It's an amendment which requires the government to table the eligibility and means test requirements for the Commonwealth prac payment before any new grant payment can commence. This amendment is very important because in the bill there is literally no detail about how this payment is going to be delivered. For many stakeholders and higher education providers from whom we heard during the bill inquiry, there is a lot of concern about the nature of this payment because it's not being administered through Centrelink. It's actually being administered via some grant bucket. While we support the prac payment for teaching, nursing, midwifery and social work students, which will apply from 1 July 2025, we are very concerned, and we share the concerns of higher education providers about the way in which this has been proposed and will be administered.

Amendment text

(1) Clause 2, page 2 (table item 9), omit the table item, substitute:

9. Schedule 4

The later of:

(a) the day this Act receives the Royal Assent; and

(b) the day after draft amendments to the Higher Education Support (Other Grants) Guidelines 2022 specifying extra conditions of eligibility to receive a grant to assist higher education providers to provide payments to students who are undertaking mandatory practicums as part of their course of study are presented to the Senate.

However, the provisions do not commence at all if the event mentioned in paragraph (b) does not occur.