The Australian guarantee will allow banks to make use of its Guarantee Scheme for Large Deposits and Wholesale Funding for another seven weeks, with eligibility to originate debt under the scheme winding up on 31 March 2010, the Treasurer, Wayne Swan, announced yesterday.The final date for banks to apply for access to the guarantee is 24 March 2010.Use of the wholesale guarantee has declined over recent months, with around two thirds of recent bank sales of bonds made without the guarantee, according to the Reserve Bank of Australia in its quarterly statement on monetary policy published on Friday. Bank of Queensland was the last bank to make use of the guarantee, topping up a pair of fixed rate and floating rate bonds with a maturity of October 2012. Westpac was the last big bank to exploit the guarantee, in December.    The Treasury website lists $166 billion in guaranteed debt and deposits as at December 2009. Banks, building societies and credit unions confirmed the guarantee over 650 funding instruments, mostly wholesale liabilities of large banks and foreign banks.The guarantee continues to apply until the maturity of the liability, which is no later than some time in 2014 for most liabilities guaranteed by Treasury and listed at their website.For at call deposits of more than $1 million, the guarantee will continue until October 2015.The guarantee on other retail deposits of up to $1 million, covered by the separate Financial Claims Scheme, will continue "until the cap is reviewed in October 2011," Swan said.