Anthony Chisholm (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Minister for Education) Share this | Hansard source

I was going to thank senators for their contribution in this debate, but I'll just thank Senator Henderson. I note that she did commend the bill as part of her other commentary, but I will leave that for another day given the hour.

The Better and Fairer Schools (Information Management) Bill 2024 amends the Student Identifiers Act 2014 to extend the system of national unique student identifiers to the school sector, allowing school students across the country to have a singer identifier that will travel with them throughout their education, from school to higher education and VET. The bill meets the Commonwealth's obligations under the current National School Reform Agreement to set up the architecture for school identifiers to be issued to students.

Practical use cases for school identifiers must be agreed between the Minister for Education and state and territory education ministers. This important safeguard is backed by robust privacy protections in the bill. These safeguards keep privacy at the centre of the student identifier system, protecting students whilst they benefit from the opportunities a streamlined and unified system offers.

I table an addendum to the explanatory memorandum relating to this bill. The addendum responds to matters raised by the Scrutiny of Bills Committee. I thank Senator Henderson for her contribution on this bill and I commend the bill to the chamber.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.