Conditions placed on Australian National University registration

Australia’s national university will have a black mark next to its operating licence for the next three years, after the higher education regulator slapped conditions on its registration.

The Australian National University (ANU) has been ordered to strengthen its integrity mechanisms and improve training and information flows for its governing council. The institution has also been given two years to complete a “governance and council strengthening programme” overseen by outsiders.

The ruling follows a 14-month “compliance assessment” by the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (Teqsa), amid governance scandals that led to the removal of ANU’s vice-chancellor, the resignation of chancellor Julie Bishop and a damning report from the Australian National Audit Office.

Teqsa also took the unprecedented step of overseeing the recruitment of Bishop’s successor, while the federal government is consulting on legislative changes aimed at “strengthening” ANU’s “accountability, representation, appointment processes and institutional culture”.

The university said it had “already committed to and commenced” work to meet Teqsa’s demands by outlining its proposed “reform actions” in its submission on proposed amendments to the ANU Act. “The university will continue to work openly and constructively with Teqsa as we…strengthen governance arrangements,” a spokesperson said.

While ANU is not the first Australian university to have conditions imposed on its registration, it is the most prestigious and the only one with conditions prevailing.

In 2021, Perth’s Murdoch university was given a conditional registration of four years rather than the customary seven because of shortcomings in its treatment of international students. But the conditions were removed and its registration extended just nine months later.

Charles Sturt University likewise had conditions imposed in 2019 over international education failings, but one of the conditions was removed two months later. The remainder were revoked in 2023, and Charles Sturt has since been registered for the maximum seven-year term.

The National Tertiary Education Union said ANU now had the “dubious distinction” of being Australia’s only public university with conditions on its registration. “There will be those who cry ‘regulatory overreach’,” predicted Lachlan Clohesy, secretary of the union’s Canberra division.

“Very few of those voices say much at all about the governance failures that have prompted regulatory intervention, and the damage that certain current and former chancellors and vice-chancellors have done to the higher education sector. I’d suggest that university leaders…spend more time reflecting on why things have arrived at this point.”

Teqsa said ANU’s “strengthening” programme must include nine “deliverables” including a financial sustainability plan and updates to the risk management framework, the strategic risk register and the charters and statutes of the council and council committees.

The programme must also include an “organisational stakeholder engagement plan” guaranteeing that the university “meaningfully consults stakeholders on future proposals involving major financial or organisational change”.

The expert or experts running the programme must be approved by Teqsa and invited to most council meetings for at least 12 months, with ANU submitting “progress reports” on the programme every six months.

ANU also has nine months to ensure “effective management of conflicts” and develop induction training for new council members, along with annual training on the “responsibilities”, “expectations” and “appropriate behaviours” of council members.

Teqsa imposed the conditions after finding that the ANU did not meet several of the “threshold standards” for registration. “[We] identified concerns regarding culture, confidentiality, conflicts of interest, strategic planning, informed decision-making, risk management, oversight of performance and subsidiaries, record-keeping and training,” the agency said.

john.ross@timeshighereducation.com