Latest on the Foundation Licence

WIA President, Michael Owen, VK3KI, today made the following announcement:

“The WIA has been in constant contact with the ACMA in relation to the introduction of the new Foundation licence and the changed privileges for the existing novice licensees.

In order for the new licences to come into effect, it is necessary to amend a number of legislative instruments including the Amateur Licence Conditions Determination and the Qualified Operators Determination. A Determination is subordinate legislation and has the force of law. Amendments to legislation are subject to very strict procedures including the requirement that they must be placed before Parliament and may be disallowed.

The amendments are in the process of being drafted by the specialist legislative draftsmen in the Attorney Generals Department. When this process is complete, the amending Determinations will be submitted to the ACMA Board for its formal approval. The Determinations will come into force when registered on the Federal Register of Legislative Instruments.

It is only when the Determinations are so amended that the ACMA will be able to issue certificates of proficiency to enable the issue of the new Foundation and other licences.

I believe that these processes will result in the first Foundation Certificates of Proficiency being able to be issued by the ACMA in September.

Only this week has the WIA received sufficient clarification on some issues from the ACMA to enable the Board to commit to the costs and resource involved in putting into effect the training of candidates for the accredited assessor system we have proposed.

We know that the ACMA will issue certificates of proficiency for the new licences on the basis of the submission of evidence of qualification by the WIA, in turn based on certification by WIA Assessors, qualified as described in the document “Assessment of Competency in Amateur Radio, March 2005” which can be found on the WIA website.

Fred Swainston on behalf of an RTO will conduct Amateur Radio Competency Assessment training on behalf of the WIA over a full weekend in each of Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide

Final dates and the venues for each training course will be announced shortly.

We are seeking applications for these training courses from suitable candidates nominated by WIA Affiliated Clubs, with a view to as broad a geographical cover as possible. The number of participants in each course must be limited.

Candidates must hold either an Unrestricted, Intermediate or Limited amateur licence, and be a member of the WIA.

After successful completion of the course the candidates will be qualified to apply for registration as an Approved WIA Assessor, and will then be able to assess candidates for the Foundation, Standard and Advanced amateur licenses.

Through various state and regional representatives, the WIA has already started to contact clubs right across the country to finalise these arrangements.

If a club is not yet affiliated, we will be able to arrange affiliation very quickly indeed, once we receive the completed application for affiliation.

If any Affiliated Club is unable to meet all the costs involved in respect of the attendance of their nominated candidate at the training course, the club should contact the WIA secretary as we have set aside some funds for assisting clubs in such circumstances.

It is now up to us, with the help of the clubs and their most qualified candidates to make the vision of a new licence structure, with a Foundation Licence attractive to a new group of amateurs, a reality – a new world of amateur radio in Australia.”

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