EDITION - 19

THE VET SECTOR

THE OFFICIAL MAGAZINE FROM
COMPLIANCE ANDQUALITY ASSURANCE (CAQA)
SANDHU’S MESSAGE
for the 19th Newsletter

In this newsletter, we are happy to announce that

the VET ministers are looking into the issues and
matters that we all experienced in the current
vocational education and training regulatory
environment.

The Federal, State and Territory skills ministers are

working together through COAG on a national
approach. At CAQA we are pleased to hear that
finally, a shared vision is being developed that will
be implemented by all Australian governments.

In this newsletter, we are covering the following

articles:
• VET ministers announced changes to the
Australian Skills Quality Authority
• The communiqué for the COAG Skills Council
Meeting (20 September 2019)
• A potential audit of the Australian Skills Quality
Authority by the Australian National Audit
Office (ANAO)
• RTO experiences with ASQA from the front line
- Part 2

CAQA works as a community and we encourage

everyone to engage and play an active role
in the sharing of information. If you have an
interesting story to tell, handy hints on attacking a
compliance issue or, questions you need answers
to or even suggestions for future issues; please
share them at info@caqa.com.au.

Thank you to everyone who has contacted us,

forwarded our newsletter to others to subscribe,
asked us to help them with their validation of
training and assessment resources or for an
internal health check. Our newsletter now has
more than 41,500 subscribers, which make The
VET Sector Newsletter one of the most read and
subscribed to newsletters in Australia. It is the
contributions that you, as subscribers, make that continues our ongoing success.

COMING UP
In our upcoming newsletters as we will starting the following article series:
• RTO experiences with ASQA from the front line - Part 2
• The major issues with current legislative and regulatory standards - Part 1
• Who is there to support the training organisations and what RTO representatives
should know in this age of ASQA and uncertainty
• How to be a strong sustainable training organisation
• The assessment system in your RTO
• Training and assessment strategies
• Conduct, manage and monitor continuous improvement
• AVETMISS data requirements
• Successful digital marketing for RTO businesses
• The international student market and demand
• The financial viability risk assessment

How has been your experience with the current regulators? Share your views with us
via email info@caqa.com.au.

Regards,

Sukh Sandhu
Director
Compliance, Resources, Risk Management & Quality Assurance
Career Calling International
VET MINISTERS ANNOUNCE
CHANGES TO THE
AUSTRALIAN SKILLS
QUALITY AUTHORITY

VET ministers announce changes to

the Austratlian Skills Quality Authority

Sharing the most recent announcement from the Senator the Hon Michaelia Cash,
Minister for Employment, Skills, Small and Family Business and The Hon Steve Irons
MP, Assistant Minister for Vocational Education, Training and Apprenticeships

The Australian Government today announced reforms to the agency responsible for
regulating the vocational education and training sector, the Australian Skills Quality
Authority (ASQA).

Minister for Employment, Skills, Small and Family Business, Senator the Hon Michaelia
Cash, said the reforms respond to key recommendations of the Braithwaite and Joyce
Reviews, including supporting ASQA to expand its scope to adopt a more educative
approach to lift quality in the delivery of vocational education and training (VET).

“Improving the quality of VET is a priority of the Australian Government, and this
includes ensuring the sector’s regulatory environment is reasonable, transparent and
effective,” Minister Cash said.

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Assistant Minister for Vocational Education, Training and Apprenticeships, Steve Irons
MP, said the Government has set a strong direction for the future of VET.
“With appropriate regulatory reforms, we can deliver a vocational education sector
that provides workforce skills and relevant up-to-date qualifications that are well-
matched to the evolving opportunities of Australia’s modern economy.”

As the national regulator for Australia’s VET sector, ASQA regulates training providers
to ensure they meet nationally approved quality standards.

“I am keen to ensure that training organisations are well placed to understand their
requirements and that the regulator has the right tools and information to regulate
them effectively,” Minister Cash said.

“As part of these changes Mark Paterson AO, the Chief Commissioner of ASQA, has
decided the proposed shift in direction for ASQA provides an appropriate time for him
to step down and pass responsibility for managing the next phase of ASQA’s evolution
to others,” Minister Cash said.

“I would like to thank Mark for the leadership he has provided to ASQA since January
2017, including managing the removal of a large number of poor quality training
providers that arose as a result of past practices and the VET FEE-HELP debacle.”

ASQA Commissioner Saxon Rice will act in the role of Chief Commissioner as of 7
October 2019.

Reference: click here.

COMMUNIQUÉ FOR
THE COAG SKILLS
COUNCIL MEETING
(20 SEPTEMBER 2019)

In the last COAG Skills Council Meeting in Melbourne on 20 September 2019 all federal,
state and territory skills ministers unanimously agreed that the Australian Skills Quality
Authority (ASQA), Australia’s national VET regulator, should “improve its engagement
with the VET sector” and expand its role in helping to educate training providers.

The inaugural meeting of the COAG Skills Council issued a Communique available
here, https://docs-jobs.govcms.gov.au/documents/20-september-2019-coag-skills-
council-communique and discussed both the Braithwaite and the Joyce Reviews
of VET and how they have highlighted the importance of training providers being
helped to understand their obligations, while ensuring that “regulatory decisions are
transparent”.

Skills Ministers agreed on key priorities to ensure Australian vocational education and
training (VET) is a responsive, dynamic and trusted sector that delivers an excellent
standard of education and training. It agreed on reform priorities and discussed short,

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medium and long term areas for action to inform the delivery of a shared reform
roadmap to COAG in early 2020. The Council tasked skills officials with developing the
draft roadmap for consideration at the next Council meeting in November 2019.

Members agreed on three future priorities for VET system improvements:

Relevance – actions in this area will ensure that VET is relevant and
responsive to the job market, employers, industry and learners.

Quality – actions in this area will support public confidence in the

quality and value of VET for students throughout their lives and move
it to parity with the higher education system.

Accessibility – actions in this area will ensure all prospective students

and employers can access suitable information and training when
and where it is required, and include a specific focus on supporting
access for disadvantaged Australians.

The COAG Skills Council agreed on the importance of placing learners, from every
background, at the centre of VET reform. Members also agreed that industry taking
greater responsibility for the skills and training of their workforce will be central to the
achievement of the COAG vision for VET.

A key topic of discussion was that effective regulation is central to the quality of
and confidence in the VET sector. The COAG Skills Council agreed agreed that the
national regulator, the Australian Skills Quality Authority (ASQA) should improve its
engagement with the VET sector and expand its educative role.

THE VET SECTOR | CAQA - Compliance & Quality Assurance | Edition-19 7

A POTENTIAL AUDIT OF THE
AUSTRALIAN SKILLS QUALITY
AUTHORITY BY THE AUSTRALIAN
NATIONAL AUDIT OFFICE
(ANAO)

The Australian National Audit Office is the national auditor for the Parliament of
Australia and the Government of Australia. It reports directly to the Australian
Parliament via the Speaker of the House of Representatives and the President of the
Senate.

ANAO has scheduled a potential “performance audit” of Australian Skills Quality

Authority (ASQA) for its 2019-2020 regulatory activities. For more information, please
refer to https://www.anao.gov.au/work/performance-audit/australian-skills-quality-
authority

This audit would examine the effectiveness of the Australian Skills Quality Authority’s
(ASQA’s) operations. ASQA is the national regulator for Australia’s vocational education
and training (VET) sector. It provides regulatory oversight for the VET sector in all states
and territories except Western Australia and Victoria, where its remit is limited to
courses taught nationally from registered training organisations in these jurisdictions.
In 2018–19, ASQA’s budget was $54 million.

All training organisations are encouraged to contact ANAO through their “contact us”
page if you would like to submit any information regarding Australian Skills Quality
Authority or its officers.
ANAO Contact us page is available through the following link; https://www.anao.gov.
au/about/contact

THE VET SECTOR | CAQA - Compliance & Quality Assurance | Edition-19 8

 RTO EXPERIENCES
WITH ASQA FROM
THE FRONT LINE
- PART 2

We are continuing to share the RTO experiences from the front line with the current
regulatory body of vocational education and training, Australian Skills Quality Authority
(ASQA).

1. Completely unjust and untrue grounds used by Australian Skills Quality Authority
(ASQA) for RTO rejection

THE VET SECTOR | CAQA - Compliance & Quality Assurance | Edition-19 9

2. No exit meeting with the RTO, no information regarding where an organisation is
compliant or non-compliant, no investigation of complaint and no one to hear the
injustice that happened to the RTOs.

3. Completely unprofessional behaviour from the regulatory body with contradictory

statements and malicious conduct throughout

4. Allegations and unfounded claims without any truth

THE VET SECTOR | CAQA - Compliance & Quality Assurance | Edition-19 10

5. You can be either compliant or non-compliant; not compliant and then in the next
submission or hearing non-compliant

6. Where is consistency in the regulatory practice?

7. ASQA and its officers indulged in completely unprofessional and unethical practices

THE VET SECTOR | CAQA - Compliance & Quality Assurance | Edition-19 11

8. ASQA auditors not following their own legislative and regulatory guidelines and
requirements.

9. No clarity or setting up expectations and ever changing the goal-posts

10. Preparing and circulating completely bogus maps with highly confidential details
to public and other RTOs to “destroy” Australian businesses and individuals

Do you have any information that you would like us to share? Send them to info@caqa.
com.au.

THE VET SECTOR | CAQA - Compliance & Quality Assurance | Edition-19 12

A 19-MEMBER PANEL
INDUSTRY VET STAKEHOLDER
COMMITTEE WORKING
TO DEAL WITH THE VET
CHALLENGES

The Morrison Government has established its Vocational Education and Training (VET)
Stakeholder committee to help drive its significant agenda of reform.

Scott Morrison has flagged that VET reforms are a key reform agenda priority and
is working to deal with the challenges outlined in the Joyce review that declared
confidence in the sector was declining, outcomes were inconsistent and not aligning
with industry needs and that the system was too complex to navigate for students.

The highly experienced committee was handpicked, to ensure we have the talent and
knowledge informing the Government’s skills sector initiatives.

VET Stakeholder Committee membership

Members will meet monthly through to June 2023.

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 Organisation Representative Position

Adult Learning Australia Ms Jenny Macaffer CEO

Australian Chamber of Ms Jenny Lambert Director, Employment

Commerce and Industry Education and Training

Australian Industry Group Ms Megan Lilly Head, Workforce

Development

Business Council of Australia Ms Megan Kirchner Head, Tertiary Education

Career Development Ms Wanda Hayes National President

Association of Australia

Career Industry Council Mr David Carney Executive Director

of Australia

Community Colleges Australia Mr Don Perlgut CEO

Council of Small Business Mr Peter Strong CEO

Organisations Australia

Enterprise Registered Training Mr Chris Butler Assistant Director

Organisation Association

Family Business Australia Ms Anne-Marie National Product

McNally Manager

Foundation for Young Mr Alex Snow Head of Research

Australians

Independent Tertiary Mr Troy Williams CEO

Education Council Australia

Jobs Australia Ms Debra Cerasa CEO

KPMG Ms Sue Bussell Partner, Workplace

Relations Advisory

National Apprentice Ms Dianne Dayhew National Executive

Employment Network Director

National Australian Mr Ben Bardon CEO

Apprenticeships Association

National Employment Ms Sally Sinclair CEO

Services Association

PwC Ms Sarah Caplan Partner, National Skills

Lead

TAFE Directors Australia Mr Craig Robertson CEO

THE VET SECTOR | CAQA - Compliance & Quality Assurance | Edition-19 14

THE VET SECTOR
NEWS

India is reforming education for the first time since 1986 – here’s why Australia
should care
India released a Draft National Education Policy (DNEP) in June 2019. It’s the first
comprehensive policy proposal on education in the country since 1986 and a major,
game-changing statement.
Australia has a moral duty to engage with the global challenge of providing quality
education to hundreds of millions of Indian youth. And by engaging with India as
it rolls out this policy, Australian universities stand to gain knowledge and research
capacity, among many other things.
For more Information, please click here.

Job Outlook Launches Skills Match

Job Outlook is an initiative of the Australian Government Department of Employment,
Skills, Small and Family Business. Job Outlook provides information about Australian
careers, labour market trends and employment projections.
For more Information, please refer https://joboutlook.gov.au/skills-match.aspx

THE VET SECTOR | CAQA - Compliance & Quality Assurance | Edition-19 15

PM holds first meeting of skills expert panel
Prime Minister Scott Morrison has convened the first meeting of the high-level Skills
Expert Panel that will advise the government on the implementation of its VET
reforms.
The panel is headed by VET review author Stephen Joyce and includes the Mitchell
Institute’s Peter Noonan and businesswoman Dr Vanessa Guthrie.
The panel had its inaugural meeting in Canberra last week ahead of the prime
minister’s departure to Washington. The meeting included the Minister for
Employment, Skills, Small and Family Business, Senator Michaelia Cash, and the
Assistant Minister for Vocational Education, Training and Apprenticeships Steve Irons.
Also meeting in Canberra last week for the first time was the VET stakeholder panel,
comprising representatives of peak bodies that will be part of the consultation on the
VET reforms..
For more Information, please click here.

Business should offer university-level degrees

Education Minister Dan Tehan wants companies to offer degree-level apprenticeships
in an aggressive push to shake up the university sector and get more value out of the
$36 billion a year the government spends on higher education.
He will tell university vice-chancellors and business people on Monday there is no
reason why a company could not offer a qualification equivalent to a Masters degree.
For more Information, please click here.

50,000 disadvantaged students receive support to succeed

More than 50,000 disadvantaged students are being supported to stay in school and
go on to further studies or a job through a Morrison Government funded program.
The Morrison Government has provided $48 million from 2016-20 to support The Smith
Family’s Learning for Life Program.
Minister for Education Dan Tehan said the Learning for Life Program has now passed a
major milestone of supporting more than 50,000 disadvantaged students.
“Our Government’s support is helping The Smith Family boost the number of students
it supports by 24,000 across more than 90 disadvantaged Australian communities,” Mr
Tehan said.
For more Information, please click here.

Transforming the Collection of Student Information

TCSI is a program driven by collaboration and innovation and as a result things are
constantly evolving. For your convenience all of the TCSI team’s latest advancements
and achievements will be listed below, with reference to the date they were published.
For more Information, please refer https://heimshelp.education.gov.au/resources/TCSI

THE VET SECTOR | CAQA - Compliance & Quality Assurance | Edition-19 16

Three reasons why Generation Z are deserting university
We all know the importance of education and qualifications.
Younger generations are pushing themselves to stand out from the crowd to recruiters
and optimise their future careers. Traditionally, teenagers would attend university to do
so but in recent years there has been a significant change.
Generation Z are becoming more inventive in how they gain their knowledge. After
having witnessed millennials attend university for staggering fees and be left in an
alarming amount of debt, it appears that university is not as popular as it once was.
But exactly what are these alternative methods and how do they compare with
university?
For more Information, please click here.

‘Perverse’ loan incentive funneling students into uni rather than TAFE
The NSW Skills Minister has called on the federal government to extend the HECS
tertiary loan system to TAFE, arguing there is currently a “perverse incentive” for
students to choose university over a trade because there is no up-front cost.
Concerns over the decline in vocational education and a funding disparity with the
higher education sector was raised by state ministers during the Skills COAG held in
Melbourne on Friday.
For more Information, please click here.
 Talk To Our Experts Now !

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2/10 Lawn Court, Craigieburn, VIC 3064 Australia

1800 266 160 info@caqa.com.au www.caqa.com.au

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Disclaimer: The information in this newsletter is for general informational purposes only and it is generalist in its approach. The information
presented in this newsletter is not legal advice or legal opinion, and it is not intended to be tailored to the specific circumstances of any
particular case and should not be relied upon as such. Persons should seek professional legal and compliance advice before acting upon any
of the information in this newsletter.