The Assembly Learning Grants and Loans (Higher Education) (Wales) (Amendment) Regulations 2008

Explanatory Note

(This note is not part of the Regulations)

The Assembly Learning Grants and Loans (Higher Education) (Wales) Regulations 2008 (S.I. 2008/1273) (W.130) (“the 2008 Regulations”) provide for financial support for students who are ordinarily resident in Wales taking designated higher education courses in respect of academic years beginning on or after 1 September 2008.

These Regulations amend the 2008 Regulations.

Regulations 4 to 7, 9 to 11, 13, 14, 25 and 27 (d) and (k) deal with typographical errors in the 2008 Regulations.

Regulations 8, 12, 15 and 16 amend regulations 23, 38, 56 and 59 of the 2008 Regulations. Those provisions of the 2008 Regulations provide for grants and loans for living costs for full-time eligible students, together with the payment of such grants and loans. Regulations 23 and 38 of the 2008 Regulations are amended by regulations 8 and 12 of these Regulations such that, where a student spends part of an academic year in prison, that student will qualify for grants and loans for living costs on a pro-rated daily basis for the days that the student is not in prison. Regulations 56 and 59 of the 2008 Regulations are amended by regulations 15 and 16 of these Regulations such that the Welsh Ministers may pay a grant or loan for living costs in respect of a day of an academic year on which the student is a prisoner, provided that the Welsh Ministers are of the opinion that it would be appropriate in all the circumstances. In deciding whether it would be appropriate, the Welsh Ministers must have regard to the financial hardship that not paying the support would cause and whether not paying the support would affect the student’s ability to continue the course.

Regulations 17 and 23 amend regulations 67 and 82 of the 2008 Regulations so that income related employment and support allowance introduced by the Welfare Reform Act 2007 is added to the list of meanstested benefits for full-time distance learning students and part-time students. These amendments come into force on 27 October 2008 to coincide with the coming into force of Part 1 of that 2007 Act.

Regulations 18 to 22 and 24 to 29 amend Part 12 of the 2008 Regulations, which provides for support to eligible part-time students. Regulation 24 of these Regulations inserts new regulations 83A to 83J into Part 12 of the 2008 Regulations. Those new regulations provide that eligible part-time students may qualify for support by way of grants for dependants, namely part-time adult dependants' grant, part-time childcare grant and part-time parents' learning allowance (“part-time grants for dependants”). Qualifying criteria for the part-time grants for dependants are similar to the criteria for the equivalent support for full-time eligible students, payable under regulations 26 to 29 of the 2008 Regulations. New regulation 83F provides for the initial calculations to be undertaken in relation to the part-time grants for dependants and new regulation 83H provides that deductions may be made from the part-time grants for dependants. Such deductions are calculated in accordance with the new Schedule 6 to the 2008 Regulations, which is inserted by regulation 31 of these Regulations. Any such deductions are applied in accordance with new regulation 83I. The amount payable in respect of a particular element of the part-time grants for dependants is determined according to the intensity of part-time study, on a pro-rata basis, as determined by new regulation 83J.

Regulations 25 to 29 also make consequential amendments to Part 12 of the 2008 Regulations as a result of the insertion of new regulations 83A to 83J.

Regulation 30 extends eligibility for support to students who are settled in the United Kingdom but left Wales and exercised a right of residence in the EEA or Switzerland and subsequently returned to the United Kingdom to study at a higher education institution.