TAFE SA

Mr GARDNER (Morialta) (14:59): My question is to the Minister for Higher Education and Skills. Have all the 2,500 TAFE students undertaking courses at risk of losing accreditation been contacted, as the minister undertook to ensure would happen last sitting week?

The Hon. S.E. CLOSE (Port Adelaide—Minister for Education and Child Development, Minister for Higher Education and Skills) (14:59): TAFE have advised me that on the day of our discussion in the last sitting week they were informing all students associated with the qualifications mentioned that there was this report and that they would keep them up to date and also where they could come to obtain more support and advice.

Subsequently, TAFE has been undertaking a very serious process of assessing its response to ASQA, which will occur next week—it's due next week—and, as part of that, determining whether all the students who were initially caught in saying they were part of those qualifications were in fact likely to have an impact. That work is reaching its finalisation during this week and the subset of students who were initially contacted will be determined that are potentially affected still.

The reason for the distinction in the first instance is that, rather than the entire qualification coming under question, it is a question of the units of competency within them. Therefore someone involved in the qualification but not in that individual unit of competency, although they would have received the original email, will be able to be reassured that that doesn't apply to them. The students captured are from 25 March to October who were enrolled in those individual units of competency. I expect later this week to be able to be much clearer about the numbers involved and also the consequences for those students.