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Assembly Learning Grants and Loans (Higher Education) (Wales) (Amendment) Regulations 2006 No. 1863 (W. 196)
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| Summary: |
These Regulations amend the Assembly Learning Grants and Loans (Higher Education) (Wales) Regulations 2006. The effect of the principal changes is summarised below.
Changes made to implement EU requirements
(Regulations 4(a), 5, 7, 17- 22, 24, 25, 29 - 31, 34 - 36, 39 - 42 and Schedule 1).
Students must satisfy certain eligibility criteria to be potentially eligible for support towards either their tuition fees only or their tuition fees and maintenance support. These criteria have been revised and include changes made in implementing EU Directive 2004/38 on the rights of EC nationals and their families to move and reside in other Member States. The new criteria are set out in the revised Schedule 1 to the Principal Regulations as substituted by these Regulations.
The changes introduce new categories of students who may potentially be eligible for support. These include:
- EC nationals and their family members who acquire the right of permanent residence in the UK (after a continuous period of five years residence in the UK) (tuition fee and living costs support);
-Family members of economically inactive EC nationals who have yet to acquire the right of permanent residence (tuition fee support only);
- European Economic Area (EEA) or Swiss self-employed persons and their family members (tuition fee and living costs support);
- Dependent direct relatives in the ascending line of EEA or Swiss migrant workers (tuition fee and living costs support);
- "Frontier" workers and "frontier" self-employed persons (tuition fee and living costs support);
- Children of Swiss nationals/spouses or civil partners of Swiss nationals (tuition fee and maintenance support).
Change also enables payments of support where students acquire the right of permanent residence or become an EEA or Swiss: worker; self-employed person; frontier worker or frontier self-employed person or are a family member of such a person or the child of a Swiss national during the course of an academic year.
The Regulations also make a number of other changes which are consequential upon the changes in the new Schedule 1.
College fee loans
(Regulations 4(b), 32, 43 and Schedule 2).
Amendments to the Principal Regulations introduce a new form of support namely a loan in respect of the college fees payable by a qualifying student to a college or permanent private hall o the University of Oxford or to a college of the University of Cambridge in connection with his or her attendance on a qualifying course.
Other changes
The following provisions of the Principal Regulations are amended, and new provisions, added as follows-
- Regulation 3 (Transitional provisions); amended to make it clear that references in the earlier regulations to the Secretary of State are to be read as (or as including) references to the National Assembly for Wales (regulation 6);
-Regulation 6 (duration of period of eligibility): amended in relation to certain categories of eligible students (regulations 8 - 11);
- Regulation 7: some changes to the previous study rules (regulations 12 -16 and 23);
- New regulation 11A: provides that a grant or loan for fees may not exceed the fees payable by the student, and that to receive a loan the student must enter into a contract with the National Assembly (regulation 19);
- Regulation 30: changes made to rules about eligibility for special support grant (regulations 26 - 28);
- Regulation 50: changes made to rules about eligibility of part-time students so that the National Assembly now has a reserve power to confer eligibility in a case not otherwise expressly covered (bringing the rules in this respect in line with those for full-time students) (regulation 33);
-Regulation 53: changes to certain amounts to be deducted when calculating support for part-time courses (regulations 37 -38);
-Schedule 4: changes to the rules governing financial assessment of students' contributions to financial support (regulations 44 -47).
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| Made Under: |
Teaching and Higher Education Act 1998 (C. 30) - sections 22, 42(6) and 43(1)
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| Amending: | Assembly Learning Grants and Loans (Higher Education) (Wales) Regulations 2006 (126)
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