Phillip Barresi (Deakin, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

This matter of public importance, which says that the government is risking the living standards of Middle Australia by its failure to adequately address reforms to build our capacity, is plainly a wrong assertion. It is absolutely hypocritical that the member for Jagajaga has been chosen to be one of the speakers today on this very MPI. How many times did we hear the former Minister for Education, Science and Training plead with the member for the Jagajaga to ask questions about trade and vocational education and training? Yet the member for Jagajaga has the hide to come here today and criticise the Treasurer for paying scant regard to the whole concept of education and trades in the budget speech yesterday. This is a shadow minister who could not bring herself to actually utter the words ‘vocational education and training’. She could not bring herself to even talk about it. Instead she wanted to talk about university places and, through her very actions, denigrate and belittle the wishes of a lot of young kids who want to move into the trade areas.

The Labor Party does not have good form on this issue. When the Leader of the Opposition was the Minister for Employment, Education and Training, apprenticeship numbers were driven down. The number of apprenticeships under the minister for employment and education—who is the present Leader of the Opposition, Mr Kim Beazley, the member for Brand—went down by 122,600. Under the coalition government, more than 400,000 apprentices are in training today, which is a far cry from the Australian Labor Party’s position. Labor has a real cheek to come in here today to talk about the government’s failure to build the capacity of the Australian economy.

Of course, we are used to the ALP doing this. The member for Lilley and the member for Jagajaga used the MPI to make points that have no substance. The member for Lilley came in and said that our plan, through the budget, is to take people down a low-wage path. The best indication of where we are taking the Australian people and the economy is to look at what we have done in the last 10 years. We are now debt free. The budget that was brought down yesterday by the Hon. Treasurer indicates that no debt is owed by this government. Member for Jagajaga, how many times has that happened in the history of the Commonwealth? Go away and look at how many times that has been done by Australian governments over the last 100 years. The answer is twice. The last occasion was followed by the disastrous Whitlam government era in the early 1970s.

Far from being a low-wage economy, we have seen a 14 per cent increase in real wages under this Prime Minister and through the Treasurer’s stewardship of the economy. The member for Jagajaga should not come in here and criticise the government’s ability to build the capacity of the Australian economy as well as our record on vocational education and training.

The Treasurer has already outlined in his contribution on the MPI the government’s infrastructure contributions to rail and road. The superannuation changes will provide an incentive to people to further their contributions to superannuation, knowing that they will receive their contributions tax free. That will build national savings. What are national savings used for? National savings are used by banks and investment houses to further invest in our economy and in infrastructure.

Yesterday we also had the wonderful news, which this opposition has failed to mention, that as a skills-building policy initiative the government is putting funding into medical research. These bright Australian people will be making a contribution to the Australian economy and, through their contribution, there will be a flow-on effect to other occupations, skills and trades.

The member for Jagajaga has no form on this. In fact, it is the member for Jagajaga who has turned her back on the young kids who want to get into vocational education and training. These kids are basically told that it is a university degree or nothing else. We have had ministers coming into this place and saying over and over again, ‘We need to develop an Australian psyche which values vocational education and training and which places it at the same level as a university degree.’ The opposition has failed to do that.

The member for Jagajaga outlined some recent announcements by the ALP on TAFE and further education. It has been long overdue, but they have finally announced a policy on it. She talked about the assistance that the opposition will give to young kids to enable them to enter TAFE colleges and pay for the charges. But has the member for Jagajaga ever picked up the telephone and called Steve Bracks or Morris Iemma or written a letter to them to ask why they have increased the charges for TAFE courses? Member for Jagajaga, have you ever picked up the phone and spoken to your colleagues, the premiers of Victoria and New South Wales, and asked them, ‘Why are you creating a disincentive for these young kids’—who often come from households with income levels that would struggle to pay some of the TAFE fees—‘by increasing the charges’? No, she has not done that at all. Yet she comes in here and criticises the government’s initiatives on vocational education and training. She criticises the fact that the government has increased apprenticeship numbers from the low of minus 122,000 under the Labor Party to over 400,000. But of course she will not attack members of her own party in the states—who do, after all, have the principal responsibility for our TAFE systems—for what they have done to drive people away from the TAFE institutions.

The member for Jagajaga ridiculed the intervention about Australian technical colleges made by one of my colleagues. She said that she was glad about the intervention and laughed it off. Member for Jagajaga, my understanding is that your colleague in the Victorian parliament, Premier Steve Bracks, announced only a few weeks ago a model for introducing technical colleges into the Victorian education system that is modelled on the federal system. It has not got all the good parts about it; there are deficiencies in the Bracks government model. But at least the Premier has looked at our model and taken our lead. Yet you ridicule this government’s attempt at introducing Australian technical colleges throughout Australian electorates.

I am pleased that we have allocated around $343 million over five years to these 25 colleges. They are not all up and running; there are about four that are up and running. I am pleased that one of them, the Ringwood Secondary College, is in my electorate. This technical college has been overwhelmingly hailed by the schools in the area, the parents and the kids. They recognise that this is a very positive contribution. I am very proud of that initiative by the Minister for Education, Science and Training, and I am particularly proud of the fact that there is one in my electorate. The thing about the Australian technical colleges that the member for Jagajaga has failed to recognise is that it is a model which brings in local industry. This model looks at what industry wants and says, ‘This is the type of education we are after.’

This budget does build capacity. There is over $181 million for a range of collaborative vocational and technical education initiatives to build a better future for all Australians. Each year, more than 1.7 million Australians enrol in publicly funded vocational and technical training. That increase in the number of enrolments has been brought about by this government. I have a graph here—the ALP is very good at showing graphs—which shows Australian government expenditure on VTE. Members do not need to see the numbers but they can see that there is an upward trend here: there is increasing expenditure, not decreasing expenditure. The budget that we brought down yesterday indicates that even more money has been allocated for apprenticeships and employers. I denounce this MPI. (Time expired)

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