§ Mr. Sheermanasked the Secretary of State for Education and Science (1) if he will introduce legislation to ensure that Ministry of Defence employees and their offspring will not be excluded from receiving higher education grants on the basis of residence abroad during the previous three years;
(2) if (a) Ministry of Defence employees and (b) their offspring on returning to the United Kingdom from abroad are entitled to a higher education grant irrespective of their posting over the previous three years.
§ Mr. BrookeNo. To be eligible to receive a mandatory award, an applicant must normally have been ordinarily resident in the British islands for the three years preceding the start of his course, but excluding any residence here wholly or mainly for the purposes of receiving full-time education. However, under the provisions of regulation 5(4) of the Education (Mandatory Awards) Regulations 1984, an applicant may be treated as ordinarily resident where his local education authority decides that he has suspended his ordinary residence because he, his spouse or his parent or guardian has been temporarily employed abroad. These rules apply to all applicants regardless of the nature of the relevant employment. Eligibility for discretionary awards is a matter for each individual local education authority.