Garrett clamps down on school funds after breach

FUNDING for independent schools will be more rigorously monitored after a decision to take money back from a Muslim school

FUNDING for independent schools will be more rigorously monitored after a decision by the NSW government to take back $9 million in government funding from Australia's largest Muslim school.

At the meeting of state and territory education ministers in Sydney today, federal Schools Minister Peter Garrett will ask them to agree to stricter reporting guidelines for independent schools as well as nationally consistent definitions of "not-for-profit", to prevent the misuse of public funds.

Mr Garrett's announcement follows revelations in The Australian that Sydney's Malek Fahd school paid millions of dollars in "management fees" for non-existent services and inflated rents to the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils.

The school draws about 75 per cent of its funds from state and commonwealth funding. At the time of the payments many of the senior board members of the schools were also on AFIC's board, including school director and AFIC president Ikebal Patel.

On Tuesday, NSW Education Minister Adrian Piccoli announced he would force the school in Sydney's southwest to pay back $9m after concluding the school's payments to AFIC meant it had been operating at a profit and was in breach of school funding legislation.

Mr Piccoli has also asked the NSW Police and the Australian Securities and Investment Commission to investigate the payments from Malek Fahd to the peak Muslim body.

Mr Garrett will also ask ministers to support a clear and coherent definition of the required use of public funds, and new minimum requirements for school viability to prevent school closures.

States will also be asked to establish joint investigations with the commonwealth when schools are under suspicion of misusing taxpayer funds.

The big item on the agenda today is expected to be teacher quality, with ministers asked to endorse a new framework for assessing the performance of teachers and accreditation standards for professional development courses.

The ministerial council will also receive an update on federal government plans to overhaul school funding in line with the recommendations of the Gonski report, with the commonwealth expected to tie any funding system to further reforms to improve the quality of teaching.

Mr Garrett yesterday urged his fellow ministers to continue the national approach on teaching reforms, in which states and territories have agreed to national teaching standards, national registration of teachers and national accreditation of degrees.

NSW and Victoria recently released discussion papers on ways to improve the quality of teaching, while Queensland is still considering the recommendations of a paper commissioned about two years ago.