House of Representatives

Explanatory Memorandum

(Circulated by authority of the Minister for Employment, Skills, Small and Family Business, Senator the Hon Michaelia Cash)

STATEMENT OF COMPATIBILITY WITH HUMAN RIGHTS

Prepared in accordance with Part 3 of the Human Rights (Parliamentary Scrutiny) Act 2011

TRADE SUPPORT LOANS AMENDMENT (IMPROVING ADMINISTRATION) BILL 2019

The Trade Support Loans Amendment (Improving Administration) Bill 2019 ( the Bill ) is compatible with the human rights and freedoms recognised or declared in the international instruments listed in section 3 of the Human Rights (Parliamentary Scrutiny) Act 2011.

Overview of the amendments

The purpose of the Bill is to amend the Trade Support Loans Act 2014 ( the Act ).

The amendments improve the administration of the Trade Support Loans Program by:

•

Empowering the Secretary to provide for 'offsetting' arrangements where an amount is wrongly paid as an instalment of trade support loan (TSL). As an alternative to the department recovering the amount as an overpayment debt, the Secretary will be able to make determinations that:

•

the amount is taken to be a TSL payment; and

•

a later payable instalment of TSL is to be reduced.

•

Providing the Secretary with a discretion to extend the period for notifying a change of address.

•

Aligning the minimum periods for TSL recipients to notify the Secretary of information under the Act.

Human rights implications

This Bill engages the right to education contained in Article 13 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights ( ICESCR ).

In particular, Article 13(2)(b) states that secondary education, including technical and vocational secondary education shall be made generally available and accessible to all by every appropriate means and in particular by the progressive introduction of free education.

The Act promotes an individual's right to education by providing access to financial assistance, in the form of a trade support loan ( TSL ), during a qualifying apprenticeship. In order to be undertaking a qualifying apprenticeship, the TSL legislation requires an individual to be enrolled in vocational education at certain prescribed levels.

The amendments made by the Bill, empowering the Secretary to provide for 'offsetting' arrangements where an amount is wrongly paid as an instalment of TSL, might be seen as limiting an individual's access to education insofar as the Secretary's exercise of this power will reduce future amounts of TSL available to an apprentice.

However, this measure will reduce the instances in which the Department of Employment, Skills, Small and Family Business ( the department ) will need to pursue apprentices for an overpayment debt whilst the Commonwealth continues to concurrently pay the apprentice further TSL instalments. An offsetting arrangement is preferred to the overpayment debt recovery process as it reduces the administrative burden for apprentices and the department, and increases the likelihood of successful debt recovery.

Further, offsetting a wrongly paid amount against a future TSL payment, rather than pursuing the amount as overpayment debt due in full to the Commonwealth, will reduce the immediate financial burden imposed on an apprentice, during the period of their vocational education. As such, this measure has the potential to assist more apprentices to complete their study and is therefore compatible with the right to education.

The Bill is compatible with human rights. To the extent the Bill may have limited impact on a person's access to education, the limitation is reasonable, proportionate to the policy objective and for legitimate reasons.