Since its start in 2010, the National Registration and Accreditation Scheme has been an important national regulatory reform that benefits everyone accessing healthcare anywhere in Australia.

Before the National Scheme was introduced, health practitioner registration in Australia involved eight separate state and territory regulatory systems with differing legislation, requirements and scope of professions.

There were 85 separate health practitioner boards and more than 65 different pieces of legislation.

‘A move to national registration meant that physiotherapists could be registered against consistent national standards and it would be easier to work across different states and territories without having to register in each jurisdiction,’ Physiotherapy Board of Australia Chair Kim Gibson said.

A Productivity Commission report on Australia’s health workforce, released in January 2006, highlighted significant barriers to the workforce caused by the fragmented regulatory arrangements across Australia and the professions.

The report recommended a single national registration scheme as well as a single national accreditation system for education and training.

Agreement to reform

In July 2006, the Council of Australia Governments agreed to set up a single national registration scheme and a single national accreditation scheme for health professionals.

On 26 March 2008, the Intergovernmental Agreement for a National Registration and Accreditation Scheme for the health professions was signed by the prime minister, the premiers of all states and the chief ministers of the territories.

It set out the framework under which the National Scheme would operate.

It mandated a Ministerial Council, an independent Australian Health Workforce Advisory Council, a national agency with an agency management committee, national profession-specific boards, committees of the boards, a national office to support the operation of the scheme, and at least one local presence in each state and territory.

National Law

The Health Practitioner Regulation National Law Act had to pass through state and territory parliaments.

Achieving policy agreement across every state and territory and with the Commonwealth was a big task.

The National Law established National Boards for each regulated profession and a new organisation, the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (Ahpra), replaced 85 separate regulatory boards.

The National Registration and Accreditation Scheme started on 1 July 2010 across Australia (on 18 October 2010 in Western Australia), regulating 10 professions, including physiotherapy.

‘This was achieved through leadership, cooperation and collaboration across jurisdictional borders. The registered health workforce has since grown, with now 16 regulated professions and over 800,000 registered health practitioners,’ Kim says.

With the introduction of the National Scheme:

• practitioners needed to meet national standards in core domains


• a practitioner could register once, renew yearly and practise anywhere within Australia within their registration


• courses of study needed to meet national standards to be Board approved


• all students enrolled in an approved program of study were to be registered for the first time


• all registered health practitioners were published on a public, online register


• anyone could raise a concern about the health, conduct or performance of a registered health practitioner anywhere in Australia.

Greater focus on safety

A key driver for reform was to address professional practice issues, including repeated misconduct or negligence of health practitioners.

It was proposed that national registration would better protect the Australian community by reducing the risk of practitioners avoiding sanction by moving around Australia.

Today, we have a national online register so that anyone can look up the registration details of a practitioner.

Code of conduct

Ahpra and the National Boards set a code of conduct that outlines the expectations of professional behaviour and conduct for registered health practitioners.

This code seeks to assist and support registered health practitioners to deliver effective regulated health services within an ethical framework.

The code is currently being updated and recently went out for public consultation and feedback.

Click here for more information, and here for more about the code of conduct public consultation. This content was supplied.