Redistribution pool of medical places

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Establishing the 2021 redistribution pool

The 2018–19 Budget announced a number of important measures across both the Health and Education portfolios to better manage the supply of medical graduates and expand opportunities for learning and training in rural Australia. One of these strategies will establish a small pool of medical Commonwealth supported places (CSPs) drawn from existing university allocations to give the Australian Government flexibility to support key health workforce priorities as they emerge.

The pool will withhold around two per cent of existing commencing medical CSPs (60 commencing places) every three years for redistribution between universities starting from 2021. The first round for 2021 will focus on helping to build the rural and regional medical workforce.

Discussion Paper

The department has released a discussion paper inviting stakeholder comments on the establishment and implementation of the redistribution pool. The paper also invites input to help develop specific policy parameters for the rollout of the redistribution process over successive triennial periods.

The discussion paper includes the new Assessment Framework and guiding principles that will support universities developing proposals for new or expanded medical programs. All proposals for new medical schools and/or medical CSPs going forward will be assessed against the Assessment Framework.

Submissions

Public submissions to the discussion paper have closed.

The department received 28 submissions in total.