The highly anticipated tabling of the Senate Committee’s Education Services for Overseas Students Amendment (Quality and Integrity) Bill 2024 inquiry report has been postponed until tomorrow, Wednesday 9 October.
The Senate Education and Employment Legislation Committee was due to present its report in the Senate today, the first day of the Parliamentary sitting week. However, a decision of the Senate to rearrange its routine of business at the start of today’s sitting means that the report will now be tabled tomorrow instead.
As at the time of writing, the Bill is still listed for debate in the Senate tomorrow. Although given that the Senate Committee inquiry report is not due to be tabled until tomorrow, and Senator Henderson is seeking information by 5pm tomorrow (see below), it is likely that this will be postponed. The Koala continues to watch this space.
Other activity in the Senate today
In the Senate today, Senator Sarah Henderson amended a motion that she had previously moved, which was subsequently agreed by the Senate, seeking data from the Department of Treasury and Department of Home Affairs.
In the amended motion, Henderson is seeking, by no later than 5pm on 9 October 2024 the following data. Note that the final point regarding NOM was one of the additions to the motion:
- the number of student visas applied for, issued and rejected in the years 2019 and 2022on a month-by-month basis, by number, broken down into each sub-category of visa (ie school, public university, private higher education provider, private vocational and education training (VET) provider etc.);
- the number of current or former student visa holders who have lodged a protection visa application for each month, for each of the calendar years 2019, 2022, 2023 and 2024;
- the number of current or former student visa holders who have lodged an appeal to a refusal or cancellation for each month, for each of the calendar years 2019, 2022, 2023 and 2024;
- with respect to net overseas migration (NOM) as forecast in the 2024-25 Federal Budget, the sub-components which make up the NOM forecasts being overseas migrant arrivals by visa and citizenship group as well as the overseas migrant departures by visa and citizenship group; and
- within the ‘student – higher education’ category of the NOM forecasts as set out in the 2024-25 Federal Budget, the breakdown between the students attending public universities, private higher education providers and private VET providers; and
- Treasury’s current internal working calculations of the NOM.
