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College to learn its funding fate

Francis CurroComment News

The college was placed under investigation after the Department of Education and Training raised concerns about its independence, financial management and governance arrangements.

Five other schools were initially also under investigation.

Two – Malek Fahd Islamic School in Sydney and Islamic School of Canberra – have since had their funding approval revoked.

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The department issued a notice to the Langford college that it would need to demonstrate its full compliance with the Australian Education Act – including independence of its operations – before April 11 or risk revocation of Federal funding.

Federal Education and Training Minister Simon Birmingham said the reason why two schools had their funding removed earlier was because the other four schools had “genuinely engaged independent support in preparing their response”.

He said the other two schools “did not acknowledge the issues, did not engage their own independent support, had limited engagement with the Department and did not put forward amendments to their constitution”.

“After carefully considering the responses received from the authorities for Malek Fahd Islamic School in Sydney and Islamic School of Canberra, my department determined to revoke the funding approval for both authorities,” Mr Birmingham said.

“Australians rightly expect that every taxpayer dollar committed to school education is genuinely expended on school education.”

He said the department had written to Langford Islamic College in relation to the investigation.

Mr Birmingham launched the review into six schools affiliated with the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils in May last year.

In November last year, the department issued a notice to the six schools detailing the department’s concerns.

The department invited each authority to ‘show cause’ why its approval to receive Federal Government funding should not be revoked.