These Regulations, which come into force on 1st August 2000, amend the Education (Student Loans) (Scotland) Regulations 2000 (“the principal Regulations”). The principal Regulations govern loans under the Education (Scotland) Act 1980 for eligible students attending designated courses of higher education.

The principal Regulations are amended to allow the Scottish Ministers to pay loans to students on distance learning courses as well as students actually attending courses of education (regulations 3-5). A minor consequential amendment is made to regulation 13 of the principal Regulations which governs entitlement to a loan when absent from a course to ensure that the regulation applies only where attendance is a requirement of the course (regulation 8).

Regulation 6 amends the conditions which a part-time student must meet to be eligible for a loan by clarifying the date on which the relevant conditions must be satisfied and removing the requirement that married students must have been married for a period of two years.

Regulation 9 amends regulation 15 of the principal Regulations to remove the need for annual regulations to change to the level of interest payable on loans.