Mehreen Faruqi (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

This bill empowers the minister to determine by legislative instrument that the regulator, ASQA, need not or must not accept or process initial applications for RTO registration for a period specified in the instrument. The bill currently places no maximum time limit on that period. This amendment limits to a maximum of 12 months the period that the minister can suspend the processing or acceptance of RTO registration applications, and, if the minister seeks to suspend applications for a period of time longer than 12 months, they would need to table another legislative instrument. This does ensure parliamentary scrutiny of the minister's power to suspend the processing of RTO applications at least every 12 months, which is an important consideration for the Greens as well. So we do support this, and we support an increase in parliamentary scrutiny of the ministerial discretion. We will be supporting this amendment.