Chris Trevor (Flynn, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise tonight to address the Social Security and Other Legislation Amendment (Australian Apprentices) Bill 2009, which seeks to benefit Australian apprentices who are eligible to receive payments under two new Australian government programs—Skills for Sustainability for Australian Apprentices and Tools For Your Trade—under the Australian Apprenticeships Incentives Program. This bill ensures that eligible Australian apprentices receive the full benefit of the payments without deductions. The bill makes minor adjustments to the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997, the Social Security Act 1991 and the Veterans’ Entitlements Act 1986 to exempt from taxation and treatment as taxable income payments made to Australian apprentices under the two programs. In addition, this bill exempts the value of the payments made under the Skills for Sustainability for Australian Apprentices and Tools For Your Trade under the Australian Apprenticeships Incentives Program from treatment as assessable income for taxation, social security and veterans affairs purposes. The amendments ensure that eligible Australian apprentices receive the full benefit of the payments made under the two new programs and are consistent with the taxation treatment of previous programs that have paid personal benefits to Australian apprentices.

The Skills for Sustainability for Australian Apprentices payment is a pilot program within the Skills for the Carbon Challenge initiative. This initiative is an outcome of the Australia 2020 Summit and aims to accelerate the response of industry and the tertiary education sector to climate change. To encourage Australian apprenticeships to undertake sustainability related training, payment of $1,000 will be provided to eligible Australian apprentices who have successfully completed the required level of training, which teaches skills in sustainability and environmentally sustainable work practices.

The Tools for Your Trade payment, within the broader Australian Apprenticeships Incentives Program, combines and extends three administratively complex programs previously available to Australian apprentices into the one payment. This new payment comprises five separate cash payments totalling $3,800 paid over the life of the Australian Apprenticeship. The new arrangements reduce the administrative burden on employers and broaden eligibility criteria, benefiting more Australian apprentices and ensuring that Australian apprentices in skills shortage trades are eligible for the same level of financial support regardless of age and employer size. These two new programs represent significant measures that encourage Australian apprentices to develop skills in sustainable buildings and industry and ease the financial burden for Australian apprentices undertaking Australian Apprenticeships in areas of national skills shortage.

One organisation that is doing wonderful work for apprentices is Gladstone Area Group Apprentices Ltd. This company is situated in my home town of Gladstone, Queensland, in the electorate of Flynn. Since their inception in 1985 Gladstone Area Group Apprentices Ltd, commonly known as GAGAL, has facilitated skills development through the employment and training of apprentices and trainees to service the needs of my community of Flynn. Today this community includes the Banana, Miriam Vale, Calliope and Duaringa shires as well as Gladstone city, where they employ over 450 apprentices and trainees. A group training organisation or GTO like GAGAL offers a comprehensive service for both employers and potential employees. Through the coordination of apprenticeships and traineeships, job seekers are able to regain recognised skills and qualifications that will create the foundations for a lifelong career in their chosen trade. For the business community of Flynn, GAGAL is able to provide a strong support network for employing apprentices and trainees without having to commit to the full term of training. This leads to a more diverse and exciting training period for the employee, while allowing greater flexibility and freedom for the host employer.

The Central Queensland area traditionally has a high demand for trades in the manufacturing and construction industries and GAGAL offers apprenticeship opportunities in 20 different trade classifications from boilermaking to carpentry. Its traineeship programs also cover a wide variety of categories, including business, retail and horticulture. All of the field officers come from within these fields, and their years of industry and business experience provide invaluable support for their apprentices and trainees. GAGAL works closely with business and industry interests in the area and has established close relationships with major employers in my electorate such as Anglo Coal, Bechtel and BMA Blackwater Mine. GAGAL also offers school based apprenticeships and traineeships that allow high school students to develop skills and acquire qualifications while continuing their secondary studies. It should be noted that in 1997 GAGAL initiated the first school based apprenticeship program with the commencement of 11 apprentices in metal fabrication. The outstanding and overwhelming success of this program and the interest it generated have seen school based training grow exponentially across the nation. Today thousands of students undertake school based apprenticeships and traineeships in every state and territory in Australia.

GAGAL has constructed hundreds of houses, duplexes and units across the area, including important community projects like the Roseberry House Youth Shelter in Gladstone. GAGAL was integral in the formation of GAGAL Biloela, set up in 1997 to service the growing number of apprentices in the Callide and Dawson valleys district. GAGAL established GAGAL Blackwater in 2005 to further improve services to their major host, BMA Blackwater Mine.

The GAGAL pre-employment program is designed to assist disadvantaged Indigenous community members into the workforce. The program is funded through the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations and works one to one to ensure that participants are job ready and able to take up full-time employment at the end of the program. Participants are encouraged into apprenticeship opportunities as and when they become available. GAGAL continues to maintain its commitment to the Central Queensland Indigenous community and has overseen a number of very successful Indigenous employment programs. GAGAL Pre-Employment is a pre-employment program with a difference, offering Indigenous participants individually tailored training packages covering all aspects from removing barriers to obtaining gainful employment. Participants are required to be registered with or eligible for Centrelink assistance and to be currently unemployed with a desire to obtain employment. Throughout the program, and depending on individual needs, participants in small groups for six weeks are provided with formal and informal training in areas such as cultural safety, health and fitness, certificate II in life skills, numeracy and literacy, drug and alcohol, goal setting, confidence and self-esteem.

Skills for Sustainability for Australian Apprentices is an outcome, as I said earlier tonight, of the Australia 2020 Summit. It aims to accelerate industry’s and the tertiary education sector’s responses to climate change by providing practical incentives for industry to focus on developing skills for sustainability. The incentives contained in the Skills for Sustainability measure are designed to encourage employers and Australian apprentices in selected National Skills Needs List occupations to undertake a threshold level of sustainability related training. The goal is to develop an appropriately skilled workforce that can meet the rising demand for sustainable buildings, technologies and industries.

The new Tools for Your Trade payment represents a substantial improvement on previous arrangements for both Australian apprentices and their employers. Under the previous arrangements, Australian apprentices were required to claim the three payments from two different providers. As each of the programs had different eligibility criteria, Australian apprentices in the same occupation may have received different levels of financial support based on criteria outside their control such as age or the size of their employers. The new Tools for Your Trade payment addresses these inequities and inefficiencies. The streamlined delivery arrangements also remove unnecessary red tape. The new Tools for Your Trade payment program will include agricultural apprentices and trainees in rural and regional Australia, horticultural apprentices and trainees, furthering the Rudd Labor government’s commitment to the rural people of my community of Flynn and Australia generally. I commend this bill to the House.

See this speech in context