Region. Hospitality company collapses

The Austech Institute for Further Education, founded with 10 students, in Blacktown, in 2002, and now based in Ashfield, with a facility at Liverpool, announced on Friday it was going into voluntary liquidation, leaving more than 750 fee-paying hospitality students out of pocket. Its closure is part of a shakeout of the sector in which several high-profile colleges have closed and international student enrolments have fallen because of the global financial crisis, a strong Australian dollar and changes to skilled migration policy, according to The Sydney Morning Herald. By 2007-08 turnover from its Ashfield and Liverpool campuses had reached $30.4 million and it was hailed by BRW magazine as one of Australia's 100 fastest growing companies. ABC TV's Four Corners last year highlighted the activities of the college in a program devoted to alleged abuses in the education export industry.