The Islamic School of Canberra will take its battle to restore $1 million in federal government funding to the High Court if necessary, its lawyer says, after Education Minister Simon Birmingham stood by his decision to revoke its funding.
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The school in Weston lost its ACT registration after Mr Birmingham cut its funding over issues with governance by its operators the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils (AFIC) on Monday.
Its counterpart, the Malek Fahd Islamic School in Sydney, was stripped of its $19 million in Commonwealth funding in February.
On Wednesday Mr Birmingham said four other Islamic schools under investigation, Islamic College of South Australia, Islamic College of Brisbane, Islamic College of Melbourne, and Langford Islamic College in Western Australia would have until April 11 to show that they had addressed the concerns of the department.
But he stood by the decision to cut the funds from the Canberra and Sydney schools saying their responses were in contrast to the other schools "genuinely engaged independent support" to make "substantial changes" in their operations.
"[The] Malek Fahd Islamic School and the Islamic School of Canberra… did not acknowledge the issues, did not engage their own independent support, had limited engagement with the department and did not put forward amendments to their constitution," he said.
But Rick Mitry, the lawyer acting for the schools, said they will appeal to the High Court of Australia if Mr Birmingham tries to "derogate" from its legislative rights to ask for an internal review of the decision.
Mr Mitry said his firm would apply for a review of the Sydney school funding decision by Friday and an appeal for the Canberra school was expected to follow.
He said the Canberra school would have more time to ask for a review as it was only notified of the decision to revoke funding this week and both schools had 30 days.
The Canberra application would be similar to the Sydney appeal which would be supported by an "extensive report" from an independent accountant addressing the department's concerns, an amended constitution complying with Mr Birmingham's requirements and evidence the school operates independently of the AFIC with full control over its governance and finances.
If the internal reviews are unsuccessful, Mr Mitry said the schools would take the fight to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal.
"The review must be determined on its merits by a senior departmental officer who has been delegated the power to make decisions under the act and who was not involved in making the original decision," he said.
