Registration standards

December 2024

Ahpra and National Boards (except for the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Practice Board of Australia) have published advance copies of the revised Registration standards: English Language Skills (the ELS standards). These include:

the Common English language skills standard which applies to all applicants for initial registration in Chinese medicine, chiropractic, dental, medical, medical radiation, occupational therapy, optometry, osteopathy, pharmacy, physiotherapy, podiatry and psychology.
the Nursing and Midwifery ELS standard, which applies to all applicants for initial registration as enrolled nurses, registered nurses and midwives.

Advance copies of the ELS standards are available on the Ahpra website. Please note that the 2015 ELS standards will remain current until the revised ELS standards come into effect by April 2025. We are focusing on improving the applicant experience and will provide more specific information about when the standard will come into effect in early 2025.

Read the news item for further information about the updates to the ELS standard and what you need to know about any changes before they come into effect.

Registration standards define the requirements that applicants or registrants need to meet to obtain or maintain registration or endorsement of registration. The following registration standards have been developed by the Psychology Board of Australia and approved by the Australian Health Workforce Ministerial Council.

Mandatory registration standards

Under section 38(1)(a)-(e) of the National Law the Board is required to have the following five registration standards:

Document name	PDF	Accessible format	Date of effect
Continuing professional development registration standard	PDF (171KB)	Word version (104KB,DOCX)	1 December 2015
Criminal History Registration Standard	PDF (249KB)	Word version (574KB,DOCX)	1 July 2015
English language skills registration standard	PDF (574KB)	Word version (577KB,DOCX)	1 July 2015
Professional indemnity insurance arrangements registration standard	PDF (110KB)	Word version (92.1KB,DOCX)	1 December 2019
Recency of practice registration standard	PDF (360KB)	Word version (77.8KB,DOCX)	1 December 2016

Psychology registration standards

Under section 38(2) of the National Law the Board has developed the following additional registration standards for the psychology profession:

Document name	PDF	Accessible format	Date of effect
General registration standard	PDF (86.3KB)	Word version (86.7 KB,DOCX)	2 May 2016 – 30 November 2025
Provisional registration standard	PDF (85.6KB)	Word version (306 KB,DOCX)	1 June 2017 – 30 November 2025
Area of practice endorsement registration standard	PDF (116KB)	Word version (53.0 KB,DOCX)	1 December 2019

Advance copy of revised Provisional and general registration standards

The Board has updated the competencies for general registration as a psychologist in Australia. An advance copy of the Professional competencies for psychology can be found here. The competencies will come into effect on 1 December 2025.

Ministerial Council has approved removing the current competencies from the Provisional and general registration standards to take effect on the same date.

Document name	PDF	Accessible format	Date of effect
Advance copy: General registration standard	PDF (82.5 KB)	Word version (82.9 KB,DOCX)	1 December 2025
Advance copy: Provisional registration standard	PDF (106 KB)	Word version (86.1 KB,DOCX)	1 December 2025

Notice of change

The Ministerial Council has approved changes to the Provisional registration standard and the General registration standard to take effect on 1 January 2029. More information is in the Notice of change:

Notice of change to the provisional and general registration standard (86.9 KB,PDF), Word version (73.8 KB,DOCX)

Retired versions

Document name	PDF	Date of effect
Retired version: Area of practice endorsements registration standard	PDF (223KB)	9 March 2011 to 30 November 2019
Retired version: Professional indemnity insurance arrangements registration standard	PDF (335KB)	1 June 2012 to 1 December 2019
Retired version: Provisional registration standard	PDF (338KB)	1 June 2012 to 31 May 2017
Retired version: Recency of practice registration standard	PDF (335KB)	1 July 2010 to 30 November 2016
Retired version: General registration standard	PDF (223KB)	1 July 2010 to 1 May 2016
Retired version: Continuing professional development registration standard	PDF (337KB)	1 July 2010 to 30 November 2015
Retired version: Criminal history registration standard	PDF (240KB)	1 July 2010 to 30 June 2015
Retired version: English language skills registration standard	PDF (337KB)	1 July 2010 to 30 June 2015
Retired version: Professional indemnity insurance arrangements registration standard	PDF (332KB)	1 July 2010 to 31 May 2012
Retired version: Provisional registration standard	PDF (336KB)	1 July 2010 to 31 May 2012
Retired version: Area of practice endorsements registration standard	PDF (663KB)	1 July 2010 to 8 March 2011