Australian Immigration Daily News

The Migration (Specified courses and exams for registration as a migration agent (Capstone provider) Amendment Instrument (LIN 21/044) 2021 (the Instrument) is made under subregulation 5(4) of the Migration Agents Regulations 1998 (the Regulations).

The instrument amends Migration (IMMI 18/003: Specified courses and exams for registration as a migration agent) Instrument 2018 (IMMI 18/003), to update the exams an applicant can take to register as a migration agent. IMMI 18/003 specifies courses and exams for registration as a migration agent for the purposes of the Regulations. This includes specifying a provider for the Capstone Assessment (Capstone).

The instrument provides that beginning 1 January 2021, the new and sole provider of the Capstone is Legal Training Australia, as determined by the procurement process undertaken by the Office of the Migration Agents Registration Authority (the OMARA).

The Department undertook a procurement process to determine the Capstone provider, which involved publishing an open Request for Proposal on the AusTender website for anyone in the market to apply for. The Office of Best Practice Regulation was also consulted and considered that the instrument dealt with matters of a ‘minor nature’ and that ‘no regulatory impact statement was required’.

Whilst The College of Law Limited ceased being the Capstone provider on 31 December 2020, applicants will continue to be able to rely on the assessment delivered by The College of Law for registration as a migration agent until 31 December 2021. This will ensure that applicants who passed the exam before 1 January 2021 are still able to use their exam results to register with the OMARA, as the exam results are valid for 12 months as per subsection 9(1) of the IMMI 18/003. Consequently, there will be no adverse impact on applicants who have previously received an assessment delivered by The College of Law.

The instrument also amends IMMI 18/003 to remove references to the common assessment items (the CAIs) as the CAIs were specified to be a prescribed examination only if passed before 1 January 2018. CAIs were only valid for 12 months, and as such, are no longer current. The CAIs were assessment items that formed part of the Graduate Certificate in Australian Migration Law and Practice. Recommendation 16 of the 2014 Independent Review of the Office of the Migration Agents Registration Authority (the Kendall Review) recommended a stand-alone Capstone de-linked from the prescribed university courses or any of the universities offering it. The Government supported this recommendation, and the Capstone became the prescribed examination in 2018.

Source: LIN21044.pdf and LIN21044-Explanatory-Statement.pdf