AHISA SUBMISSION

Senate Standing Committees on Community Affairs’ Legislation Committee 

16 August 2019

Inquiry into Family Assistance Legislation Amendment (Extend Family Assistance to ABSTUDY Secondary School Boarding Students Aged 16 and Over) Bill 2019

In conjunction with the Australian Boarding Schools Association (ABSA), AHISA wrote to the Senate Standing Committees on Community Affairs’ Legislation Committee in support of enactment of the Family Assistance Legislation Amendment Bill.

AHISA was particularly concerned that the Bill had been referred to the Legislation Committee ‘to examine the interaction between the proposed Bill and the continued viability and adequate funding of local schools and educational opportunities in communities’. The AHISA/ABSA submission makes a case for boarding schools in the provision of education to Indigenous students.

The submission argues that extending the eligibility of families of Abstudy students to receive the Family Tax Benefit until their children complete Year 12 will remove what amounts to a financial disincentive from the complex mix of pressures that influence students’ decision making on whether to complete their schooling.

Submission to the Inquiry into the Family Assistance Legislation Amendment Bill